UVA
by Princess Geta
Summary: Royal Pain's far fetched idea of creating a Villain Academy may have not been so far fetched after all, one does exist and six students desperately want out.
1. This is UVA

**Title**: UVA

**Author:** Princess Geta

**Rating:** PG-13

**Disclaimer: **Don't own Sky High or any of it's characters, but UVA and it's character's are mine.

**Summary:** Royal Pain's far fetched idea of creating a Villain Academy may have not been so far fetched after all, one does exist stirring from underneath the earth's surface. For all those that attend the Underground Villain Academy (UVA) hope is nonexistent, cruelness is expected, and a normal life style is unheard of. The students there live with strict guidelines and go through life waiting to graduate to become Villains. Six students cant do it anymore and attempt to escape.

**Authors Note:** UVA is going to be a lot like Sky high except for the material that they teach and whatnot, their lifestyles are going to be obviously different. This is a sky high fic so don't worry Sky high characters are going to come into the story eventually. Anything overly confusing go ahead and ask I'll try to clarify it all as much as possible but most of the stuff is going to be explained in the fic itself at some points. Any criticism to helpful suggestions are completely welcome, but please no flames I'm just letting out a weird idea I had.

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**UVA**

**the Underground Villain Academy**

_prologue__:_

"Should we put a stop to this?" A six foot tall, scruffy looking large man asked his companion beside him as they watched two kids throwing themselves at each other from across different tables in their school's large forum.

"Naw, what for?" The second man asked rhetorically, completely amused. "They ain't going to do much harm - why bring them unnecessary trouble." He stated, more than asked, smirking. The first man glanced at him, smiling, knowing that his friend was probably saying that more because he wanted to avoid the paper work, rather than out of the goodness of his heart. Hank, the second man noticed the expression his friend was carrying and elbowed him. "What? You don't believe me? I can be a good guy A.J." He said with a grin, as he crossed his bulky arms. Hank was physically smaller than A.J but was definitely more muscular whereas A.J was more height than anything else. Hank glanced at the large clock in the center of the forum they were currently watching over. "Besides, they have to go in a couple of minutes." He said more reasonably, A.J followed his line of sight and nodded in agreement, turning his attention back to the scuffle, where other students were quickly gathering.

"Oh!" Hank exclaimed, blinking. "Did not see that coming." He said grinning. "Clever little buggers, aren't they?" He asked, turning to A.J who looked more disturbed than amused. The younger of the two pre-teens apparently having swiped a hit at the taller boy with a plastic spork, hidden in his closed fist, drawing blood.

Come-on Hank," A.J started uncomfortably. "Any blood spilled we have to stop." Hank sighed at his friends sound logic, as he took a step forward and uncrossing his arms when a loud bell rung. He paused as he looked up at the sounding bell, before looking over at A.J, smiling.

"Well, there ya go." He easily stepped back to his spot, not even bothering to look back up up, knowing that all students had immediately stopped; they were all now getting off the tables, out of their seats - including the ones who had been fighting - and were all now leaving the forum for the next couple of minutes. After the students cleared out Hank and A.J made a slow walk through the forum. "Filthy little pigs, aren't they?" Hank asked with disdain, as he went around a spilled cup of orange juice. "Always amazes me how fast these brats can mess up this place." A.J nodded, lightly kicking a stray milk carton.

"Doesn't matter to me, as long as we don't have to clean it up." A.J replied, signaling with a thumb to Hank's blinking beeper on his hip. Hank looked down at it and groaned. He gave his friend one pat on the back before backing up and turning to go the opposite direction. "Where you going?" A.J asked.

"Office calling, they probably need someone to hand out messages." Hank said with a shake of his head. "I'm telling you A.J, stuff like this make's me regret not having taken my classes more seriously in '94." Hank hollered as he walked away backwards, thinking of the year he should have graduated along with the rest of his class.

"'94?" A.J asked incredulously, a large grin on his face, unable to see the growing one on Hank's face.

"Alright, alright," Hank conceded. "'92." Hank rephrased.

A.J snorted, "Try '87!" A.J shouted across the forum to the still retreating Hank who gave an indignant huff and threw one quick wave over his head to A.J before going out the double doors of the forum and into the familiar hallways of the school. He finally made his way to the Main Office, where the secretary was already waiting with a note in hand for his arrival.

"Here." She said, refusing to look up at him as he came up to the counter calmly, an eyebrow arched at her bad attitude.

"I ain't a messenger boy, sweet cakes." Hank reminded with a smile, leaning his arm lazily on the tall desk that she sat behind, his other hand out to receive the message but unwilling to take it from her.

"I ain't sweet cakes, messenger boy." She reminded angrily with a direct glare, thrusting the note into his hand. He took it with a roll of his eyes, exiting the room with a call over his shoulders.

"You know you miss me, Sandra..." Sandra went around her desk and followed quickly after him, slamming the office door closed in response as he turned back to say something else with a finger raised; Unaffected, Hank turned back towards the hall, smirking as he walked a few feet forward - giving the note a brief glance - before making a left turn down another hall. It didn't take him long to get to the classroom written on the closed note and knocked briefly before entering the loud classroom.

Immediately the class discussion quieted as students and teacher alike turned to look at newcomer. The curly red haired, blue eyed, tall male teacher went to Hank taking the note.

"_Arigatou._" He thanked, turning back to the class while reading the note. "Congratulations Miss Reynolds, it appears you have your very own new temporary tot." Hank quickly figured who 'Miss Reynolds' was from the groan from the back of the class coming from a dark brown hair, light skinned, dark eyed, 17-year-old girl that was hesitatingly standing up - glancing briefly at Hank - before quickly marching up to the front of the class and receiving the note from her teacher.

"Mr. Sand," The girl started, eyes quickly devouring the notes contents with growing confusion. "Why?" She asked helplessly, looking directly at her teacher. "I didn't do anything wrong and I didn't ask for one, c-could there be a mistake?" She asked, hopeful.

"Come-on little girl," Hank said with a bored sigh as he made his way to the door. "I don't have all day." He reminded. The girl looked over her shoulder at him unhappily- seeing only a cold smile returned, she looked back down at the note then at Mr. Sand who only nodded towards the exit.

"You may go." He assured.

The girl narrowed her eyes at the floor, following Hank out the door, refusing to walk alongside him, which failed to annoy Hank and only served to amuse him. After a few minutes of, clearly, hostile silence - the grinning Hank - looked over his shoulder. "You are right, you know." Hank casually started. She raised her eyes. "You probably really didn't do anything, it's just a thing." He said with a shrug. "Tots come and they need to be taken care of them for a while, you were probably just randomly chosen."

"Why don't they make Staff take care of them?" She asked him moodily, clearly indicating that HE should be given the responsibility, instead of her.

"'Cuz we got enough to do looking after you little bunch of ingrates." He retorted.

"Oh yeah, swell job you guys do," She said sarcastically. "Letting those kids cut up at each other the way they did today." She muttered under her breath, rubbing her arms unhappily. Hank stopped for a second at that, and after a beat, he continued to walk down the large hall with a smile.

"You're right," He admitted, with a gleam in his eyes. "That was a rotten thing to do." He acknowledged, glancing over at her with a grin. "But what do you expect? we're the bad guys little girl, this is UVA." He reminded as he stopped at a door and opened it, standing to the side to let her go in first. She shook her head.

"_Dim Diolch_, you can go in first." She said stubbornly. He arched his brow at her words, shaking his head.

"Now I know you didn't do anything wrong, you're a good girl! what was that? Welsh?" She ignored the comment and nodded towards the door for him to go in first. He chuckled but did so without another word, stopping nearly right after stepping a foot in the entrance, flabbergasted. Paige peeked in the small space left between the large man and the door and quickly her own eyes widened. "..M-Mr. Whedon." Hank stuttered.

Neither had any clue that they would find the Headmaster of UVA in this classroom; nobody at the school ever seemed to see their renown and mysterious Leader, only ever catching glimpses of him at Deaths and Special events but never having seen him this up close. Despite his shock, Hank was first to recover and remember proper protocol, swiftly grabbing the girl by the back of her neck and making her kneel with him.

"No, please, get up." Mr. Whedon insisted with a generous smile. "Thank you for escorting this young lady, you may go." Mr. Whedon said to Hank who stumbled as he got up, nodding and bowing once more before quickly leaving. The girl slowly got up as well, body trembling as Mr. Whedon studied her with some amusement. "What's your name?" Mr. Whedon asked as he signaled for her to close the door, she nervously did so.

"Paige, sir." He nodded.

"Lovely name." He remarked.

"Thank you sir, you picked it." He blinked, surprised.

"Did I?" She nodded. He nodded to himself thoughtfully; he picked names for new children once in a while. "Alright Paige," He agreed as he signaled for her to take a seat in one of the many empty desk chairs in the empty classroom. "Let me tell you about something that happened to me a few weeks ago." Paige obediently did so, going to sit as Mr. Whedon went to the back of the room where a crib sat.

"I was in the midsts of some travels, and I found this young little person here," He explained as he picked up a little boy that looked to be about three or four years old. Paige immediately tensed up when she saw the curly haired little boy barely registering a word he said. This was to be her **thing. **Mr. Whedon chuckled when he saw her expression. "Oh, don't neglect the idea so quickly, _nyen ching-duh_," He scolded with no agression whatsoever. "This is a very special little boy." He insisted, smiling. "The only boy I've myself brought to UVA in many, many years" He informed. "Now," He began again, with her full attention. "The thing about this particular child is that I do not yet know what he does and he does not speak so that has added a layer of complicated to the matter. Our staff members believe he was born mute." He looked at the sleeping boy in fascination. "I don't know what it is about this boy..." He admitted with a shake of his head, before turning back to Paige with a warm smile. "Well, my point being is I would like **you** to look after him - at least for a while - And help him develop his powers, ..." He paused with a frown, trying to remember her name.

"..Paige." She offered politely. His smile came back full force as he nodded.

"Of course, Paige." He agreed. "Will you?" He asked, smile widening as he noticed her biting her nails as she fidgeted in her seat, eyeing the infant in his arms with mild panic.

"Sir, with all due respect...I don't know if I'm ready for this." Paige explained, nervously.

"Trust me, you are more than ready." He said kindly, as he went towards her, lightly rocking the little boy from side to side to keep him asleep. "It's the way of the world, child." He explained, keeping his eyes on the infant as he carefully handed her the sleeping boy. "We adjust to our surroundings; it's that power to adjust that makes humans different from any other species on earth- well that and our thought process, ability to dream, and of course, the opposable thumb." He said waving his thumb lightly at her with a smile, trying to lighten her mood; receiving a brief smile from the girl for his effort, but still looking like she was about to throw up her breakfast.

Mr. Whedon crouched down, squatting on his haunches, as he put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "..I know you're scared, but it's just your time. What do you say?" _Like I have a choice... _Paige thought with some annoyance but carefully hid it; She nodded outwardly, working up a smile. "Great." He said patting her shoulder. "His name is Cori Westoby" Mr. Whedon explained, stepping a couple steps back to get a good look at the two of them together. He smiled at what he saw. "You'll both do great things for UVA, I can feel it in my old bones." Mr. Whedon assured, smiling. "Good luck." He offered with a wave before leaving the room.

Paige followed Mr. Whedon out the open door, closing it with her foot as she awkwardly adjusted the heavy child in her arms. She watched the headmaster leave with a sad sigh, her sight lowering to the kid. Looking him over carefully, from his light brown tousled hair, to his light skin dusted with barely visible freckles spread over his cheeks. He was wearing a white t-shirt with the initials UVA in black entwined at the left breast with the letter V in red standing out finishing it off with black slacks.

Paige looked around the empty hallway making sure no one was around before starting to walk back towards her dorm stopping, startled, when she felt movement in her arms. She tensed up, worried that he would chose that moment wake up and felt grateful when he didn't, but his head lolled to the side a little leaning, onto her chest comfortably. She cringed back at the unwelcome affection as she started to slowly walk once again.

"_Wo de tian, a" _Paige mumbled to herself, fearfully_. "P_lease help me do this right.."

_End Prologue_

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**_Translations:_**

Arigatou (Japanese) Thank you.

Dim Diolch (Welsh, celtic) No, thank you.

Nyen ching-duh (Chinese) Young one.

Wo de tian, a (Chinese) Dear God in heaven.

The use of different languages is explained in the note at the bottom of the chapter

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**_Chapter 1_**

"This is UVA"

"It's been a week and I still can't get this right." Paige groaned to herself in annoyance as she put socks on Cori, who was smiling on her bed, watching Paige on her knees before him struggling to put his socks on correctly. "You think this is funny?" She asked, noticing his expression. "Well I'm glad you find this amusing-" She stopped and glanced up at the dorm clock. "_Go se_" she muttered panicked, rapidly throwing the comb on her bed and quickly putting Cori's shoes on before scooping him up and running out of the room and down the hall and rapidly turning a corner to the wide opened double doors that let her and Cori onto a very large open living space where there was a large projector lowered on the stage with couches neatly placed all throughout the space.

"What the _gui_ took you so long!" Jordan, a 14-year old dirty blonde, green eyed, five foot five teen asked her as he moved over to give her the seat he saved for her.

"I'm sorry, I was bathing Cori-what'd I miss?" Paige asked anxiously as she sat Cori on her lap, trying to make herself comfortable.

"Nothing really so far." Jordan said with a shrug. "They were mainly arguing-"

"Paige, do you mind if I sit here?" Ruby, a sweet little innocent brown haired, green eyed 6-year old asked, pointing shyly to the space on the ground in front of Paige's legs since most of the seats of the lounge were already taken.

"_Hai_," Jordan confirmed, eyes narrowed. "Now bugger off, you little twerp." Jordan snapped, making Ruby cringe.

"_Iie_, don't listen to him Ruby." Paige immediately countered. "Go ahead, _bao bei._" Paige assured, taking a cushion from behind her and setting it on the ground for Ruby to sit on, glaring at Jordan as soon as the little girl got seated.

"May I?" Ruby asked, eyes lit up as she looked at little Cori excitedly, Paige handed him readily to the enthusiastic young girl.

"Please," Paige said happily, helping Ruby carry him correctly. Jordan yelped when he felt a hit in the back of his head, and immediately whirled around, ready to pounce on the person who dared touch him when he saw that it was his **Au Fait** [person in charge of him] grinning.

"Abel," Jordan exhaled, surprised.

"Hey, you losers." Abel greeted, playfully. "Anybody get killed yet?" Abel asked, looking up at the screen eagerly.

"You're thinking about Passions Abel, this is Days of our Lives." Jordan reminded.

"Ah, man. Passions ain't on yet?" Abel asked, frowning.

"One more hour, Abe" Jordan assured, smiling up at him.

"Sit down!" Somebody shouted from the back to Abel who glanced back at the person. Abel was 19-years old, had deep brown short hair, dark brown eyes, a light tan skin tone, who was also a pretty tall 6'1 and apparently very much in people's way.

"_BI ZUI!_" Jordan shouted back defensively making Abel grin.

"You can sit here with me if you want, Abel." Abel looked down to see Lisa, a 10-year old girl with black short hair and brown eyes that had a tremendous crush on him, something, which he was very well aware of. He nodded at the offer, smiling, letting her take him by the hand and lead her away from the others towards her seat as the show began.

After a few minutes of the show, Jordan glanced to his left where he knew Abel was and wrinkled his nose at what he saw. "Gross" Jordan mumbled, shaking his head with disappointment. Paige looked at him with confusion, then followed his line of sight to where Lisa happily was sitting on Abel's right leg watching the TV screen while Abel braided her hair. Paige grinned, looking at Jordan.

"Want me to braid your hair, Jordan?" She teased, playfully. Jordan glared at her but after a moment, grabbed his own hair to look at, self consciously.

"My hair isn't that long." He argued, somewhat defensively.

"..The fact that you can see it tells you it's too long, Jordan." Ruby said quietly with a smile.

"Nobody asked you, _niou-fun_" Jordan snapped, Ruby quickly looked away.

"Ignore him Rube's." Paige recommended. "He's just mad because they haven't said who the father of Hope's baby is." Paige said to Ruby, nodding towards the screen.

"They've been dragging it out for three days!" Jordan nearly shouted, angrily shaking his head as he turned his attention back to the screen that suddenly turned black. Everyone in the room was suddenly in an uproar, quickly standing and complaining over the malfunction.

Days of our Lives and Passions were the ONLY Television shows that UVA students were allowed to watch. UVA student's were not allowed to watch the news, cartoons, reality TV shows, regular TV series or movies because they were all too much of a risk according to the Senior Allies, the founders and creators of UVA. The unanimous decision of all five members of the Allies was that any and all television was dangerous to the mindset that UVA had provided for its students but because student's needed some form of entertainment they offered to exclude one TV series from that rule and gave the decision of which up to Mr. Whedon; who couldn't quite decide between his two favorite daytime shows: Days of our Lives and Passions, so, he asked for BOTH shows to be excluded and the Senior Allies agreed. Now almost ten years later student embraced their two strange shows, calling it their "Days of our Passion hours [DOOP]." And now that DOOP had been suddenly shut down, they were all upset - all except for Abel and Paige, who shared an uneasy look between them, knowing that this couldn't be good.

Shortly after, an intercom crackled before turning on overhead. "Good afternoon everybody, this is Mr. Sand. There has been an unfortunate accident with a student resulting in their death, will all staff, Villains and Minions report to the gymnasium for a send-off. All other students may stay in their lounges for the remainder of DOOP. That is all." The speaker turned off. Paige and Jordan stood up.

"_Bao bei_, can you please watch Cori while I'm gone?" Paige asked Ruby who nodded standing up sitting now where Jordan had sat a few moments ago with Cori beside her.

"Ready?" Abel asked, sobered completely by the news. Paige nodded following after her Au Fait. Every Au Fait could have up to two students to be in charge of, one male, one female until they graduate, something which Abel should have done almost a year ago but because Abel didn't take school seriously and he didn't want to leave his two 'losers' behind he continued to slack even still; however, Abel needed to graduate this year because student's were only given one extra year after their 18th birthday to graduate or else they would have to become staff of UVA and be unable to live in the surface of the world.

Au fait and his two tyro's [student, trainee, pupil] made their way to the gymnasium following all the other students who were chattering excitedly about the assembly. The gymnasium was the only place on the entire premises where students were allowed to use their powers, every other single room and space of UVA was power neutralized for safety. They entered silently going up to sit at the top set of bleachers.

"Haha" Jordan grinned happily holding his fingers apart showing Abel and Paige the electricity coursing through them. Paige frowned at his hands, body cringing into her seat. She hated her power so, so very much. Abel quickly noticed her recoil and immediately put an arm around her, hugging her to him.

_Walls, Paige, think walls. _Abel thought worriedly, Paige looked at him. She heard him and smiled with a nod.

"Thank you" She said honestly. She remained close as the students continued filing in, trying to hide the pain. Abel looked down at her, rubbing her arm sympathetically. Jordan lightly smacked Abel's bicep with the back of his hand, signaling towards a 13-year old girl giggling as she rubbed her hands together quickly; her hands being opened lightly by a pink fluff that was coming out, both boys noticing that the more she rubbed the wider apart her hands due to the pink stuff.

"Cotton Candy." Jordan groaned with desire. "You think she'd be willing to trade some?"

"For what? Electrocution?" Abel asked with the raise of a brow, smiling. To his right Abel could feel his arm being lifted off Paige and he turned his head to see her looking at him sheepishly. He rubbed her hair playfully and gave her a look, after a minute she nodded with a smile.

Mr. Whedon entered the room and immediately all the student's bowed their head in respect; those who were standing, knelt on the ground. Mr. Whedon signaled them to get up, smiling as he took the Microphone that Mr. Sand offered him as someone wheeled in a casket behind him.

"Good evening UVA students, it is an unfortunate reason we've all gathered here today, as Mr. Sand explained over the intercom. Your classmate Miss Catherine Adams passed away today, as she unwisely decided to attempt to leave UVA grounds." Mr. Whedon explained, gesturing to a sheet covered body inside a raised, open casket. Abel eyes immediately started to look around for somebody in particular and quickly saw the devastated teenager towards his left; Ross Odell, Catherine Adam's own Au Fait. There was sweat beads rolling down Ross' face, his face had no color and he could see him groaning quietly to himself as he anxiously rubbed the back of his neck. Seeming to feel the eyes on him, Ross eyes connected with Abel's, they both knew what was expected of Ross to do now. The young man rocked back and forth slightly, taking shuddering breaths as his hands tightly clenched his shaking knees, and without a second thought, Abel snapped his fingers. Everything froze; from the young girl passing out cotton candy to Mr. Whedon himself, time literally stopped. All except for Abel and Ross.

Ross blinked, looking around at the frozen people, baffled. "Go ahead man" Abel interrupted. Ross looked at him confused and then saw Abel nod towards the coffin. "Say goodbye to her the right way." Abel explained. Ross took a deep breath, eyeing Abel with incredulity. Receiving no further encouragement from him, Ross looked back towards the coffin and automatically stood up, swallowing the lump in his throat with difficulty as his seemingly stone legs lead him heavily down the steps. He sniffed, rubbing at his eyes impatiently, as he stumbled on the last step. Ross stood before the casket uncovering her face.

"_Feng le hun dan_.." Ross muttered with a teary smile. "What the _gui_ did you do Cathy? _Fakku_..." He muttered angrily with a shake of his head. "..." He exhaled as his eyes landed back on her peacefully sleeping face, raising his shaking hand to lightly move a stray hair away from her face. "Guess I can't blame you for trying huh?" He finally conceded softly. "_Mata aimashou._" He mumbled, covering her once again. Ross hesitated as he began to walk away, fists clenched at his sides as he glanced over his shoulder at her body. He quickly went up the steps and sat back in his seat, looking over at Abel who only snapped his fingers, making time continue going.

"-So without dragging this out longer than it has to be, will Ross Odell please step down here please." Mr. Whedon said reading the name from a small blue paper. Ross Odell did so, unhappily nearing the casket once more. "In usual circumstances," Mr. Whedon started. "We have the Au Fait incinerate the body of their tyro, and we will here as well, because the bond of a tyro and Au Fait is important to keep until the end; but since Miss Adams disgraced UVA and her Au Fait by attempting to escape, we will have Mr. Odell show the rest of our UVA student's loyalty by assuring us he knows what his tyro did was wrong." Mr. Whedon said to all students but looked directly at Ross Odell who went up to him. Mr. Whedon handed him a sword. Without a word Ross went to the body quickly picking up the sword to put through the sheeted body.

"Wait Mr. Odell" Mr. Whedon insisted, going to the body. Ross' hands shook as they held the sword up, pained as Mr. Whedon removed the white sheet covering Catherine's body. "Alright, now go ahead Mr. Odell." Mr. Whedon encouraged, stepping back. Ross shut his eyes tightly and brought down the sword through the chest of his tyro who'd been his shadow, attached at his hip for the last four years - full of mischief and joy.

Mr. Whedon handed him a torch and Ross lit her casket carefully turning on his heels and going back to the steps and up the bleachers. His eyes sought out Abel's once more and he mouthed 'Thank you' calmly, receiving a nod in reply as he went back to his seat. "As you now see, students, we do not condone betrayal here." Mr. Whedon continued. "UVA is a family." He said strongly. "And we want the best for every single one of you. Let us help you fill your potential - do not go trying to find it on your own." Mr. Whedon said gently, standing in front of the fire and the now completely silent students occupying the many bleachers. No one playing with their powers anymore.

"You may all go back to your lounges to finish the remainder of DOOP." Mr. Whedon instructed, smiling again as if nothing happened before leaving. Everyone slowly got up and started to exit the gym. They all quietly left towards their dorm sections. Abel made Jordan and Paige slow down as they followed the mass of students, before he made them come to a complete stop prior to entering their lounge again. Paige and Jordan watched him quietly as he paced anxiously back and forth in front of them, as he tried to find words to say whatever it was he wanted to say to them.

"Come-on Abel, forget about it we're missing the rest of it." Jordan said, signaling weakly towards the lounge.

"Forget Days." Abel snapped, continuing to pace.

"..." Paige watched him sympathetically. "...Abel..." She tried. He turned towards her automatically, quickly grabbing his original tyro by her shoulders, hard.

"I want you to listen to me very carefully Paige," He said passionately, eyes filled with... fear? "You are NEVER to think about; faintly imagine; or EVER dream of leaving this place. Do you hear me?" He asked, absolutely enraged. "Either of you," He said, glancing at Jordan whose jaw was clenched, unused to seeing his Au Fait so shaken. "Come here Jordan." He instructed, signaling him over with a hand; Jordan did so, feeling Abel's hand hold his shoulder. "Don't." He pleaded. "Ever. Please. I wont put a _gorram_ sword through either one of you, you hear me? she didn't just die while trying to escape, you know that, right? they did it, they caught her and they killed her for it, it was those _tyen-sah duh UH-muo_-!"

"SHH!" Paige whispered desperately covering Abel's mouth with her hands, looking around to make sure that no one around heard that.

Abel gently took her hand off his mouth, "All I'm saying..." He took a deep breathe, trying to calm down. " Is don't let yourselves be fooled, you know the truth. I don't want to loose either of you two, promise me you'll never do anything so damn stupid." He asked tiredly, both his tyro's nodded gently.

"Promise" Jordan mumbled, faced red.

"Me too" Paige assured. Abel smiled at them, exhaling forcefully; finally feeling like the bolder on his chest had moved a fraction. Shakily, he held the back of Paige's head and brought her closer, kissing her forehead. As Abel began to pull away, he pulled Jordan into a hug with his free arm, being hugged back just as tightly by his youngest tyro. After silent minutes, Abel began to pull away from the two, ruffling Jordan's hair in an attempt to lighten to the mood; giving him a gentle push to lead them towards the lounge. Jordan did as he was asked, while Abel wrapped an arm around Paige bringing her to him as they walked together to the lounge.

"How's you head feeling?" Abel asked.

"Like Jordan fried it." Paige said sighing tiredly, she stared up at him and he noticed, looking down at her.

"You're getting taller you know." He said mockingly serious, putting his hand on her head. She picked it up off her head holding his one hand between her two hands, studying them.

"...I know what you did Abel," She said quietly, he blinked in surprise but didn't respond.

Neither said anything anymore as they entered the lounge and watched the remainder of DOOP with the others who were once more laughing and going on with their day like nothing had happened; like one more amongst them had not just been picked off; like life didn't exist above them at all; like their was nothing wrong with the way they were forced to live down here and what they were expected to one day become for this institution.

Paige bounced Cori on her lap, distractedly, watching the screen but not paying attention to the pictures it showed her, as earlier thoughts entered her mind and she thought about this grand plan that UVA seemed to have for her, what plans they might have had for Catherine Adams; why be so cruel to Ross Odell? Why put him through that?

Why put them _all_ through this?

_What do you expect? we're the bad guys little girl, this is _**_UVA_**

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**_Translations:_**

Go se (Chinese) Crap.

Gui (Chinese) Hell.

Hai (Japanese) Yes.

Iie (Japanese) No.

Bao bei (Chinese) Sweetheart.

Niou-fun (Chinese) Cow poop.

Feng le hun dan (Chinese) Crazy bastard.

Fakku (Japanese) F word.

Gorram (Chinese/Firefly) F-en.

Mata aimashou (Japanese) See you again.

I think the above translation is meant in a different, happier tone but I used it in more sobered mood. There's probably another way to say it, but I didn't find it

Tyen-sa duh Uh-muo (Chinese) Goddamn monsters.

* * *

**_Next Chapter: _**_"What do you have next?" Jordan asked wanting to break the somewhat tense silence._

_"Quips II" Jordan arched a brow at him, Abel grinned. "What? you can never be too clever, little man"_

* * *

**Note:**

The use of other languages is probably confusing, I understand and I'm sorry it's mainly to show how differently the characters at UVA live where their focuses are a little stranger than at other schools, I try to usually make them only one or two word so it isn't too confusing and to hint by the tone of what their saying what it means.

For example:

When Abel is bad talking UVA and says how they killed their dead classmate and calls them "those_tyen-sa duh Uh-muo!" _you can pretty much bet he isn't saying "those crazy groovy cats!"

If I use any of the words in a wrong context, if the punctuation, the tone, the grammar of it is wrong I am so very sorry. I don't speak the majority of the languages that are constantly going to be used in here, I'm just doing the best I can so please if you understand the words I use and see that I've used them wrong don't be offended. If you want to correct me, please do so, any constructive criticism is welcome.

Now that all that's out of the way, please tell me what you think! I just really wanted to put something weird and new out there. Like I said earlier Sky High Characters will be brought into the story a little bit later, it just always bugged me a little how I go and read these sky high fics and they're immediately introduced to the sky high gang and suppose to be accepted by the readers! Just want to try something (hopefully) different. R&R please!

**:) Thank you! Arigatou! Shukran! Merci! Gracias! Grazzi! Danke Schon! Diolch:)**


	2. Tasa

**Title**: UVA

**Author:** Princess Geta

**Rating:** PG-13

**Disclaimer: **Don't own Sky High or any of it's characters, but UVA and it's character's are mine. The puns used in this chapter during the class interaction are NOT MINE.

**Summary:** Royal Pain's far fetched idea of creating a Villain Academy may have not been so far fetched after all, one does exist stirring from underneath the earth's surface. For all those that attend the Underground Villain Academy (UVA) hope is nonexistent, cruelness is expected, and a normal life style is unheard of. They live with strict guidelines and go through life waiting to graduate to become Villains. 6 students cant do it anymore and attempt to escape.

**Authors Note:** I wanted to thank my one review, **Mind Hawk**, if throughout this whole story your one review was the only one I received I'd be more than satisfied with myself because of what that one review said, I originally only made this for fun but I just wanted to put it out there and that my first review wasn't someone telling me I'm insane was a huge relief :) Thank you!

I know it's kind of a lot of information to take in these chapters but like I've said before anything overly confusing go ahead and ask I'll try to clarify it all as much as possible but most of the stuff is going to be explained in the fic itself at some points. Any criticism to helpful suggestions are completely welcome, but please no flames I'm just letting out a weird idea I had.

* * *

**UVA**

_**Chapter 2** _

"Good, he's awake." A male distant voice said over Jordan, at least, it felt distant as Jordan's sight started to clear up again. "It's fine Jordan," The voice said more clearly, "Just take a deep breath, alright?" The same voice advised.

"Now?" Another voice asked, smaller, also male.

"Now." The first confirmed. Remembering where he was suddenly Jordan quickly attempted to sit up and was ruthlessly pushed back down. "Tighten the straps." The first voice said coldly. "Jordan, you know better." He warned. Swallowing with some difficult, heart racing in his chest - Jordan exhaled shakily, trying as hard as he could to calm down and wait for the inevitable. "Good. Go ahead." Unable to help himself, Jordan tensed in anticipation of the pain and when he did, his mouth opened wide and he screamed.

Everything went black.

An hour passed by and the feeling of being submerged under water finally loosened its vice like grip and Jordan felt like he could finally come up or air; sitting up with a gasp on the gurney he was on. Taking large gulps of air, Jordan frantically looked around, immediately recognizing the white room he was in and the hesitant smile of the blonde young girl standing a few feet away, wearing a white uniform and holding a small plastic cup. Jordan eyed her warily as he swung his legs to the side in an attempt to look less vulnerable. He ran a shaking hand through his hair, eyeing the girl as she came closer.

"How long was I out for?" He asked, his voice hoarse.

"A while." The girl confirmed shyly, handing him the cup and going towards another counter to get a bottled water and handing it to him. "You still have fourteen minutes left before class is over." She pointed out, glancing at the clock on the wall. He looked over at it as well as he quickly swallowed the pill, flinching as it went down his throat. "Why'd Parra let me out early?" He asked, confused as he took another large gulp of water and stood up to stretch his sore muscles.

"Said she didn't want you in there for too long and that she knew you weren't going to be of much use today, since you're never good at strap downs." The younger girl explained, looking away. Jordan quickly turned towards her angrily. "Her words not mine." She defended, her hands up as she took a step back.

"Well damn! what does she expect? nobody likes strap downs!" He argued angrily looking at her small smile with confusion, as the girl attempted to continue looking away. "..What?" Jordan asked suspiciously, as he caught her glancing once more before looking away. Jordan slowly looked down and noticed his lack of clothes. "...I have to stop doing this." He groaned. "_Gorramit _Melissa, you've got to remind me to put clothes on-" He growled quickly going to the other side of the bed hiding from Melissa, the young girl's view. Melissa chuckled tapping an invisible button in the air with her index finger to signal behind Jordan, he looked behind him and groaned louder seeing another nurse there.

Jordan soon left what was known as the White healing Room, where student's went in and out of everyday for recovery after going to the class that Jordan had just come out of, PT, which was a 6-week, 3-year mandatory class for all students. This class prepared their UVA students for the real word Villain situations where a Villain would have to fight super heroes and in all likelihood be hurt. The institution did not want their students to loose a battle simply because they did not know how to take a hit, oh no, they would certainly prepare them for **that**; So they created PT, a demanding and excruciating class completely dedicated to increasing their student's Pain Tolerance (PT) both physically and mentally. They had different ways of doing this, every year getting more creative than the last, learning from the mistakes of previous Villains on the surface. This was the ONLY class at UVA where students were put through such severe conditions that they required immediate medical attention; conscious of the situation the Senior Allies decided that any Healer that they had in their staff or within their students would immediately go into training and dedicate themselves Full Time to the White-Room to repair injured PT students as part of the staff of Healers instead of ever graduating UVA; Any other injuries students sustained in any other class needed to be attended too by their regular school nurse for treatment.

Jordan went back to the cafeteria forum in a grumpy mood, still embarrassed that the younger girl had seen his 'business' and seemed too, almost every week now. Jordan maneuvered through the crowds easily enough to get to his groups usual table at a semi private corner where Ruby, Lisa and Abel were already sitting.

"I'm not going to drink my juice, do you want it Abel?" Lisa offered shyly, up to her dream Au Fait that she could never have.

Abel smiled at her shaking her head. "No you go ahead and drink, carrot juice got me filled up" He assured patting his flat stomach. He caught sight of Jordan approaching and gave him a nod and a warm smile. "Hey loser- why are you blushing, bro?" Abel asked curiously as his younger tyro began to blush profusely. Abel's smile widened and his eyes took on a mischievous glint. He sat in between Ruby and Lisa and in that moment pressed them to him by their ears to prevent them from hearing his next question. "Melissa see you naked again?" He asked, knowingly. Jordan rolled his eyes sitting down the blush darkening. "HA! aw man you got to stop giving her free peep shows little man, make her work for it" He joked.

"Where's Paige?" Jordan asked, clearly trying to change the subject. Abel let go of the girls, still grinning.

"I don't know," He allowed, "Probably went to pick up Cori from his class" Abel reasoned with a small shrug. Jordan nodded avoiding Abel's gaze, trying to forget about what had happened earlier to him. Jordan's eyes finally settled on Lisa who was still leaning on Abel happily, nearly purring, Jordan chuckled.

"It's ok to listen now Lisa, you don't have to lean on Abel anymore." Lisa blinked abruptly, finally realizing what she was still doing. She slowly pulled away, looking up at Abel, hoping he hadn't noticed and blushed when she saw him looking down at her, amused.

She turned away, mortified, thankful when she saw a familiar face approaching their table. "Oh look, Paige's coming - hi Paige!" Lisa enthusiastically greeted, waving at Paige who hesitantly waved back at Lisa, confused as she approached as to why Lisa of all people was so enthusiastic about her arrival.

"Hey..." She greeted awkwardly. "What's going on?" She asked, somewhat at a loss, as she set Cori down on the table and sat herself on the bench in front of it. Nobody responded to her query; Jordan was too busy scratching at a dent on the table with utter fascination, Abel was too busy smirking at Jordan, Lisa was too busy staring longingly at Abel, and Ruby was just too shy to say anything to anyone, opting to eat in silence. Paige gave them all a look clearly indicating that she thought they were insane.

"I promise they're not always this nuts.." Paige whispered secretively to Cori who only smiled in reply. Paige looked at Jordan where most of the attention seemed to be settled and stared intently at him for a minute before realization dawned on her face. "Ooh." She exclaimed, smiling. "Melissa saw your-...well," She shrugged indicating with her hands at his lower half. Jordan gave her a shocked look.

"What the _gui_!" Jordan bellowed. "This isn't fair! why do you get to use your powers in here?" Jordan asked unhappily as he looked down at his hands shaking them in an attempt to start some electrical currents through them, without any luck.

"I didn't" Paige assured. "I just figured." She explained with a much more subdued shoulder shrug. "Besides," She started, clearing her throat as she looked down at her lap. "I saw you in strap down" Jordan looked up at that, surprised, while Abel's grin faded completely and turned into a frown. This was the first time this had happened; they all usually made a big effort to avoid seeing each other in most classes because they'd agreed they not only did not want to see each other get hurt but didn't want to risk the chance of having a teacher pin one against the other during a class assignment.

"Oh.." Jordan mumbled, somewhat embarrassed. "How?" He asked, confused, recalling that PT took place in a large classroom with no windows, high ceilings and only had one metal door that was locked at all times.

"Coach Galindo sent me to take a note to Ms. Parra." She explained, almost wishing she hadn't mentioned it because of the heavy silence that followed.

"Well...You okay?" Jordan finally asked after a while, sincerely. The bell rung. They all quietly got up going to their next classes. Abel walking Jordan towards his next class, through the ominous black halls of the right wing of the school where any Physical Activity (PA) classes were along with Extra Curricular classes.

"What do you have next?" Jordan asked, wanting to break the somewhat tense silence.

"Quips II." Abel answered easily. Jordan arched a brow at that and Abel grinned. "What?" He asked. "You can _neve_r be too clever, little man." He insisted as he ruffled his hair, Jordan rolled his eyes and moved out of reach with a smile. They stopped at Jordan's classroom and Abel looked up, disdainfully, at the sign above the door that read 'Human Anatomy', which of course was a Science class but not an average Science class; this was a 9-week course where students learned about the human body. Students here specifically learned about the human body's weakest areas to show their future Villains how to exploit these weaknesses in an opponent and here they had the opportunity to practice their new learned techniques first-hand, on each other, which would require more nurse visits. Abel gave Jordan a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes, squeezing his shoulder affectionately, wishing, hopelessly that he didn't have to send this young boy in there.

"_Jun ta ma yao ming. Joo-ee_" Abel pleaded seriously.

"I will" Jordan assured, with a big smile for his mentor, receiving one last pat from Abel before he went inside his class, watched over by Abel, who walked away slowly towards his own class two hallways down. He entered a more typical looking classroom with white walls with 4 rows of semi-desks on either side of the classroom with a large desk for the teacher in the middle against the furthest wall from him, leaving an open space in the center, which the teacher usually used when addressing the class. Abel took his usual seat in the second row of desks closest to the back door, setting his bag beside him on the floor and taking out a notebook and pencil to lazily finish a sketch of Cori until class started.

He had lots of drawings of the people he most cared about and he had just started a few different ones of Cori since he became the latest addition to his group but a very well welcomed augmentation. He grinned as he thought that over, knowing that wasn't completely true - he knew his oldest tyro, and knew as soon as Paige had brought him Cori the first time that she was supremely unhappy about it. Abel flipped a few pages back to a sketch he'd made of Paige a year ago and smiled down at his girl, knowing her - at her very core, she didn't dislike Cori, she was just scared of this new responsibility but he knew she'd eventually be won over by the little boy's charm, the way he had. Little Cori was sweet, shy, and never spoke a word but, somehow, you could tell that the little boy had nothing but goodness in his heart; something, which he would willingly wager that the big guys upstairs probably were not going to be terribly thrilled about a few years down the line. He smiled at the thought, cheered up.

"Hey," Abel looked up at the greeting and gave an easy smile.

"Ruben," He acknowledge. "Hey man." Abel tapped fists briefly with the 6 foot tall dark skinned, hazel eyed, 18-year old guy before Ruben took a seat on the semi-desk in front of him. "What's up with you? you're usually here five minutes early." Abel pointed out.

"Got held up by the tyro," Ruben explained glancing over at him carefully. "Speaking of, sorry to hear about your Tyro today." Abel looked straight at him, a frown marring his features as he calmly closed his notebook.

"Which and what?" Abel asked simply.

"Your younger one, Jordan I think." Ruben said, somewhat nervously. Abel nodded for him to continue. "The toxins they gave him accidentally in PT today when they were trying to wake him up and couldn't." Ruben explained, looking around a bit anxiously making sure the teacher hadn't entered the class yet and that the other students around weren't paying attention to their conversation. "I saw him later on and Heidi told me about it since they're in PT together." Abel nodded slowly as he digested the information, looking past Ruben, clearly not happy about this. "I'm sorry man, I know you don't like to hear this but I just thought you should know, I owe you a lot and whenever I can help-" Abel shook his head, looking back at him and giving Ruben a comforting smile.

"Don't worry about it." Abel said dismissively.

"Your _fang le_!" Ruben insisted. "You've kept my secret about me and my tyro hidden for months, it's stupid as _gui_ but you do it anyway." Ruben pointed out. "Knowing that if we were ever caught, you could get punished for not reporting it." Abel shook his head.

"It's cruel that they enforce that rule so strictly," He assured supportively. " You and Heidi have something special, man." Ruben nodded with a smile.

"I know, but I just want you to know that _ana mamnoon _" Ruben said, Abel gave a brief nod.

"No problem." Ruben arched a brow, grinning.

"You understood me?" He questioned.

"_Hai._"

"Damn" Ruben said shaking his head. "And here I thought I was cool since I studied an extra language." Ruben admitted.

UVA students were required to take three specific languages throughout their UVA experience; English, Chinese (Both Cantonese and Mandarin dialect), and Japanese. Those specific three languages were chosen by the Senior Allies because they believed those three countries to be very powerful and critical for the future of the entire globe. The reasoning the Allies had all agreed on to enforce this tasking requirement was that, as Villains, they could not threaten an individual, a specific town, city, state, country, or continent if they did not know their language. If they truly wanted to take over the world they needed to be well educated, able to write memorable Super Villain speeches, and able to communicate this all to people of the world. A few small years after this curriculum was put into place, the languages they were required to learn started to blend into the normal every day conversation that it was today. Abel shrugged at Ruben's statement.

"Paige takes mainly languages for her extra curricular classes, so I pick up a word or two." Abel explained. "Arab?" He asked, Ruben nodded in confirmation.

"How old is she now anyway?" Ruben asked curiously, Abel looked up at him disinterestedly.

"Don't go there Ruben." Abel warned without any malice.

"Naw, I don't mean it like that Abel," Ruben assured. "You know I only think about Heidi. I'm just curious."

"Seventeen" Abel informed, Ruben nodded as he studied Abel's somewhat tense form now.

"Well, she's really blossoming this year." Ruben commented, attempting to be casual and not overstep any boundary. "There really is no chance of you two-?"

"_Ohayou._" The teacher greeted the students as he came into the classroom, immediately going to his desk. All conversation faded until it completely ceased as all eyes went to Mr. O'Breno; a tall red haired, blue eyed, large chinned man with a cheesy smile. "I'm a little late and we really have no time to waste, so I'm going to hand out these worksheets, give you all fifteen minutes to complete them, after which, we will do puns from a hat." Mr. O'Breno said handing out a worksheet to the filled classroom. "You may partner up for this assignment if you want, no more than two of you and you both need different answers just help each other out, Badness knows, some of you cant quip to save your life." He said, muttering the last part to himself with a shake of his head as he went back to his desk and took a seat.

"Partner?" Ruben asked Abel with a small smile. Abel smiled back simply, scooting his desk back a little to make way for Ruben to turn his almost completely around. "Alright." Ruben started, looking over the sheet.

Abel sighed, "Number one," He started. "You've implanted a bomb inside the white house, you're safely in your lair holding the trigger but before you can press it, your plans are brought to a halt when a super hero breaks into your lair and tries to stop you. Ultimately he fails, you're about to press the button to destroy the white house, what are you final words to the Hero who failed?" Abel asked, looking up from the paper and seeing a thoughtful expression on Ruben's face.

"Hm.." Ruben thought it over, lightly rubbing his knuckles against his jaw bone. "How about... 'sucks for you!' and then baam! press it." Ruben offered, Abel smiled looking back down at the paper. "Aw come-on Abe, that's good!" Ruben argued knowing Abel's polite smile when he saw it. "Fine, let's see you come up with one." Abel shook his head lightly.

"Naw, I'm not really in the mood for this today." Abel said. Ruben shook his head.

"Dude, the last thing you need is to fail an easy class with your crappy GPA." Ruben scolded.

"I know," Abel exhaled, shaking his head. "I'm just bugged, I guess." Abel admitted, putting away his worksheet in his binder to work on it later for Dorm-work knowing that Mr. O'Breno was one of the more rarely seen relaxed teachers of UVA. He figured he'd probably be the same as him if he ever became a teacher here.

Abel frowned at the random thought that popped into his mind. That definitely was not going to happen. Their was no way in hell he'd stay in this place for the rest of his life.

"Yeah I can tell," Ruben interrupted his thoughts. "Is it about Jordan? or you still upset about traitors death Ross Odell's tyro got?" Ruben asked, knowing his friend.

"Both." Abel acknowledged, frowning. "They have to stop making Au Fait's do that, Ruben..."

"Well," Ruben's voice lowered as the risky topic came up, not wanting to risk others hearing. "In the school's defense, Abel, it doesn't really happen that often." He reasoned, despite Abel's unwavering frown. "She's the first student to attempt to leave school grounds before her graduation since the '01 effort to break out." Ruben reminded. "They have to be harsh with these sort of things or else..." He shrugged. "More people would try to get away." Abel fidgeted with the edges of his binder, distractedly, easily noticed by Ruben who arched a brow, doing some quick math in his mind. "...You were there for it, weren't you?" Ruben asked curiously, Abel looked up at him, unwilling to acknowledge the question he was asking but Ruben insisted, "For the renown traitors death of '01, you were there, right?" Ruben stated more than asked.

"..."

"Come-on, Abe-"

"Yes. Okay." Abel agreed sharply, annoyed.

"So..?" Ruben asked, trying to hide the excitement from his voice; the majority of those who witnessed it had already graduated so it was rare to hear the tale from someone who actually was there instead of a over dramatized version from others who made up stories about how they sneaked in to the gym to see the event or how they'd head it from someone else.

"So nothing," Abel insisted. "They killed them." Abel said with a tense shrug.

"Dude, come-on! you are the only person I know who was there - I couldn't go in cause I was twelve! by one stinking year I didn't make it in." Ruben said, shaking his head still disappointed by the memory.

"They had them alive, Ruben" Abel snapped. "They had ALL THREE of them alive and they callously destroyed them in front of us, one by one, for simply trying to get away - Please forgive me for not wanting to reminisce over it with you." Abel all but snarled at him. Ruben stayed silent for a minute as Abel got a hold of himself, uncomfortable with the heavy silence between the two.

Ruben eyed Abel as he opened up his notebook and continued to silently sketch Cori's picture. "You're right. _Gomen_," Ruben apologized, sheepishly. "I shouldn't have." Ruben chuckled dryly. "Guess I'm fast becoming a cruel Villain myself, aren't I?" Ruben asked with a smile. Abel nodded without further comment, Ruben looked him over carefully. "No offense man, but ...I just don't picture you as a Villain." Ruben said honestly. "I never have." He admitted. "I've never seen you raise a fist at anybody, ever." Abel shook his head.

"Now YOU'RE _Fang le _man, we took PT together," Abel said dismissively, "You saw what I did to them in there." Abel reminded. Ruben barely nodded, his eyes still on Abel.

"Yeah, we did." He agreed. "I remember." He assured. "That's different though and you know it, we've got no choice in there, you do what your told and that's that. Outside of PT and requirements from other classes you've never hurt anyone. Theirs not a single student here who hasn't had an episode of violence outside of their class-it's practically expected, hell, not even your own tyro's escape the violent energy UVA gives us." Ruben said. "They've both gotten into fights." Abel shook his head.

"Paige's only been in one fight, ever," He corrected. "And Jordan hasn't been in a fight since I became his Au Fait." Abel said defensively, knowing that Jordan use to be a huge trouble maker before he was placed as his tyro.

"How longs that been?" Ruben asked, amused.

"Two years for Jordan, six with Paige." Ruben nodded.

"Alright, doesn't matter, I didn't mean anything by it." Ruben said with a shrug.

"I know. _Gomen-nasai,_" Abel said sighing shaking his head. "I'm just irritated with Jordan's situation, it's had me uptight for weeks." Abel explained. Ruben nodded in understanding at that, his own mood souring at the reminder.

"Same here. Heidi's in PT too, remember?" Abel nodded.

"But they are suppose to tell us when _go se_ like this happens." Abel insisted. "I'm his Au fait Ruben, aren'twe suppose to be informed of anything health related regarding our tyro's? anything that involves medication, classes, and punishment? How the _gui_ am I expected to be responsible for someone if they don't tell me a _gorram_ thing that's happening to them? to him?" Abel protested, trying to keep his voice down.

"I know man, I know." Ruben assured, shaking his head. "It's a tough situation we have Abel, why do you think most avoid being an Au Fait until it's forced on them? It's painful to have to sit by and see your tyro get hurt, especially for Jordan since this is his first year of PT but you went through this already with Paige," He reminded. "It gets easier man, and hey Jordan had already avoided it for a while, he could have started taking PT last year-"

"I wanted to prepare him for it. I didn't want him to take it last year." Abel interrupted. Students could immediately start PT classes when they turned thirteen no matter in what year they were (In UVA they got more by age then by school years).

"Same with me, I didn't want Heidi to take it when she was thirteen, I thought maybe if she waited a year she'd be better prepared to handle that kind of stress and pain but the girl had a stubborn head on her shoulders, she wanted to get it over with as soon as possible." Abel nodded.

"Same with Paige." He mumbled.

"And how'd it turn out?" Ruben asked, uneasily. Abel shook his head.

"Not too well, but she's alright - just quieter." Ruben shook his head trying to shake off the uneasiness and fear for his tyro/girlfriend right along with that head shake.

"Whatever happens, happens." Ruben mumbled. "Nothing we can really do about it now, right? just graduate and go take out our repressed anger on the world." Ruben half joked, grinning wanting to lighten the mood. "And unlike you," He added. "I do intend to graduate this year, so if you'll excuse me, I need to think of what I'm going to say to the hero who failed to stop me from making the white house go boom." Ruben said looking back down at his worksheet with an immediate focus. Abel watched him for a minute before turning his attention to O'Breno who was standing up.

"Alright, that's enough time for that. Turn in what you have, you can't finish it for dorm-work." He said, Ruben gave Abel a look for not even having started his. "Alright." Mr. O'Breno continued when everyone settled back down. "We've done 'Puns from a hat' before, but incase some of you forgot. The rules of the game are, I pick two of you to come up here and I'm going to give you a suggestion that I pick out of this hat." He said holding up a regular cap filled with little papers. "Who ever raises their hand first is going to react by giving an appropriate pun to the situation, if you take more than five seconds to give me a pun you will be disqualified and the round goes to your opponent." O'Breno explained. "If you say a pun but I think it's ridiculous, your opponent gets a chance to counter and if they fail to do so or if their pun is worse, the round goes to you. This exercise will take the rest of the class, which is fine by me, since I have nothing for you guys to do for the next two days." O' Breno said smiling with a light shrug. "Once we have eliminated half of you. The winners of their rounds will compete against each other until we have only one excellent punner standing who will get an absurd amount of extra credit." O'Breno finished explaining, reaching into the hat mixing the suggestions. "Any questions?"

"Is participation required?" An annoyed looking dark girl on the opposite side of the classroom from Abel, asked.

Yes Miss. Fordham." O'Breno said not bothering to even look at her, almost as if having expected that question from her. "Any real questions?" Receiving no other questions Mr. O'Breno called the complainer, Karen Fordham up and Ruben.

"That's not fair." Karen said angrily crossing her arms as she came to stand a few feet in front of O'Breno who sat lazily on his desk.

"What isn't fair Miss. Fordham?" He asked, trying not to smile as Ruben went to stand in front of her.

"You paired me up with an inept opponent who you know I'll beat so I'll have to keep going, and all because I don't want to play your stupid hat game." Karen accused.

"Hey!" Ruben exclaimed, indignant.

"I have no idea what you're talking about Miss. Fordham, now, are you ready for your suggestion or would you like some cheese to accompany that whine?" The whole class burst into laughs and groans at that lame pun. Abel shook his head as the game started, ignoring the banter from the two opponents as well as the teachers prompts, choosing instead to focus on the earlier sketches he'd been working on of the youngest member of his group.

"Mr. Sotelo?" O'Breno eventually called, Abel raised his eyes to where the teacher was looking at him expectantly.

"_Shu muh_?" Abel asked, confused. O'Breno sighed.

"Mr. Sotelo, you're up."

"Oh." Abel mumbled, quickly standing up and closing his stuff up before going to the front and desk standing in front of a male student, somewhat shorter than him.

"I still think you lost that one on purpose, Miss Fordham, which is a real shame because you really could have used that extra credit." O'Breno reminded the girl who'd only lost this last round after five quick rounds.

"No skin off my snakes." Karen reassured, running her fingers through her long black hair with a shrug and a smile. O'Breno gave her a mini glare at her attempt at a joke.

"Alright." Mr. O'Breno started, turning back to the two students in front of him and taking a paper out of a hat. "You planned to steal a precious artifact from a museum worth millions of dollars but a hero stopped you, the hero might have stopped you from taking that artifact but you can still escape imprisonment. What are the parting words you give the hero?" Mr. O'Breno asked the two. Abel's opponent quickly raised his hand, Mr. O'Breno signaled for him to go ahead.

"Well meet again! you won't be as lucky next time!" Abel's opponent said fiercely shaking his index finger in the air for emphasis. "This is not the last you've seen of me-"

"Yes, yes, we get the point Mr. Carson, quite riveting." O'Breno assured, rolling his eyes, looking tiredly over at Abel. "Can you EVER possibly top that, Mr. Sotelo?" He asked, smiling.

"You only won because you have a good weapon against muggers," Abel started uncertainly. Mr. O'Breno arched a brow.

"And what would that be Mr. Sotelo..?"

"…Your face…?" Abel finished hesitantly, the class bursting out in laughter. Mr. O'Breno rolled his eyes.

"Really cute Mr. Sotelo - you can take a seat, Mr. Carson." Mr. O'Breno said to Abel's opponent making Abel sigh, he really wasn't in the mood for this game. "Come up here, Miss Percy." Mr. O'Breno said, signaling for a girl to come up. "Alright, you're destroying the capital of Washington, a hero finally responds to the distress call and come, what is your witty greeting to the hero..?" The girl raised her hand.

"I've been expecting you..?"

"….Alright, great….Mr. Sotelo?" Mr. O'Breno asked, looking at him expectantly.

"Hello tall, dark and obnoxious." Abel said shrugging, looking at his seat longingly.

"Take your seat Miss Percy." The girl did so dejectedly.

"Mr. Stevens." The boy came and stood before the two. "You just lost a battle with a hero and the police are taking you away to lock you up forever in solitary, what is your parting remark to the hero?" Abel raised his hand, quickly. "Mr. Sotelo." Mr. O'Breno called on, surprised.

""_Liou coe shway duh biao-tze huh hoe-tze duh burn ur-tze_" Abel said, trying to not smile. Mr. O'Breno paused and gave him a perplexed look, crossing his arms lazily as his mind translated what the boy had just said. He looked up at Abel and raised his hand up and lazily ran his index finger over his eyebrow, keeping it end of it.

"Mr. Sotelo..." He started, frowning. "How does calling your opponent a 'stupid son of a drooling whore and a monkey' help your situation any?" Mr. O'Breno asked, mystified by the strange answer.

"It doesn't." Abel agreed with a nod. "But it'd make me feel better." Abel explained, with a wide smile. "I'm going to jail anyway, right? what do I care. May I sit down now, sir?" Abel asked, taking advantage of catching the teacher off guard to get out of the game, receiving a slow nod, he walked back to his desk sitting down making himself comfortable.

"...what the _gui_ was that?" Ruben asked, leaning over towards Abel confused.

"I didn't want to play anymore." Abel said honestly.

"...Ah" Ruben chuckled nodding understandingly. "Yeah me neither, that's why I got out so fast." Ruben said, Abel gave him an amused smile.

The rest of the class flew by and the winner was a light brown haired guy with an already receiding hairline a lanky body and dull blue eyes. Abel quickly put his stuff messily into his bag before hauling it over his shoulder leaving the class adjusting the strap of his backpack on his shoulder, as he made his way through the crowds of people. He smiled when he saw Paige making her way through the crowd awkwardly, holding Cori to herself who, as usual, mostly looked incredibly amused about it all. Abel made his way more expertly through the masses, stopping in front of her making her nearly walk right into him.

"Oh," Paige blinked, stopping only a fraction away from him. "Hey," She greeted, trying to muster up a smile for him but unable too. He noticed it and tilting his head a little.

"What's wrong?" He asked, putting a gentle hand on her arm and leading her to the side, away rom the traffic. She shook her head and rolled her eyes with a smile, waving it off with a hand.

"Don't worry about it. I'm just gloomy because I have to go to inside gym to drop him off for his new class." Paige explained, nodding towards the child in her arms. Abel smiled down at Cori, stroking his hair back and earning the brightest smile from the tot.

"Want me to take him for you?" Abel offered.

"_Kekkou desu_" She said shaking her head softly as she adjusted the boy on her hip, offering Abel a smile, knowing her ever selfless Au Fait would offer. "I'll do it, I'm just not looking forward to it." She explained.

"_Iie_, I insist" He said grinning, already taking Cori from her arms. "Why give you an unnecessary migraine in there huh?" He asked rhetorically.

"Are you sure?" She asked, uncertainly as Cori made himself comfortable in Abel's much larger arms.

"Why are we still talking about what's decided," Abel asked, grinning, rubbing Cori's back gently. "Go to your next class, I don't want you to be late." He insisted, shooing her off with a hand.

"_Xie xie._" She thanked sincerely before walking away in the other direction. Abel took Cori towards the gym, feeling the little boys eyes looking up at him the whole time. He entered the gymnasium and went straight for a small room at the opposite end of the gym, used for the children under five. In this class all the children were under constant surveillance by camera's and teachers alike, as they attempted to use the time with the tots to discover their powers because the space was not power neutralized.

Abel chuckled, finally glancing down at Cori as they walked towards the classroom. "Hey, look," Abel started, as he adjusted little Cori in his arms. "I know that Paige hasn't given you the easiest time, but I'm asking you to be patient with her, ok? I know it may not seem like it, but they couldn't have given you a better guardian in the whole wide world." He gushed unintentionally, smiling at the boy. "...She's just still learning how to handle looking after someone." He attempted to explain. "Finally someone's giving her a taste of what she put me through." He joked, smiling. "But hey, eventually she'll realize that no matter how labored the job is, it's always worth it in the end." He said softly, smiling at the understanding look the little boy was somehow managing to give him back. "...And if it really doesn't work out, luckily for you, she's just your temporary guardian... but between you and me?" Abel leaned in conspiratorially. "I'm hoping that isn't the case." He whispered, making Cori giggle. Abel tickled him playfully as they arrived at the class, being stopped by a woman who stood at the entrance who held a clipboard, looking like she definitely did not want to be there. She glanced up momentarily at Abel and the child before looking back down at her sheet.

"What kid is this?" The woman asked, sighing.

"Cori…Westoby, I think?" Abel asked Cori, who only giggled. She glanced up at the grinning Abel questioningly, shook her head and looked back down at her clip-board and checking something off.

"Yeah, okay- give him here." She demanded impatiently, offering her limp arms. Abel briefly read the nametag on the woman that read 'Summer Kayson' and hesitantly gave Cori to her after a moment, doing his best to give the little boy a reassuring look, carefully eyeing the room suspiciously before having to leave. Little Cori gave the room a brief look over as well as the woman set him down in the middle of the carpeted room along with three other kids that were already there; two of them pulling at each other's hair over blocks. "Alright, alright, break it up you two." Summer said annoyed, as she pulled them apart easily. Cori ignored them and crawled slightly away, looking around still at the room; it was pretty bare as far as classrooms went, except for camera's at every corner of the room. One of the long walls had a wall to wall chalk board with pictures framed up above it of 8x10 pictures of good looking graduated Villains, the center picture being of Mr. Whedon himself, proudly standing in front of the UVA Logo sign. Cori noticed three other adults other than the woman who'd carried him in; one of them sitting in a nearby chair in front of a long desk with a little girl about three years old who had a little chubby hand at her mouth, giggling, as she sat Indian style on the desk levitating.

"You're all lucky," Summer's voice rang out, catching Cori's attention immediately, as he turned back towards the woman. She put a chair in front of the whiteboard and made herself comfortable as she opened a large book in her hands, showing it briefly to them. "Today's an easy day," She assured. "No bracelets or helmets, just a story. As usual some of you will be asked to go to the back with a teacher to talk, so go quietly without disturbing story time." She instructed. Not hearing any disturbances, she nodded and began, "Alright, this one's called 'The scissor hands' the real life story of one of the most popular Villain's to ever graduate UVA." She read, holding back the urge to roll her eyes. She rather put the kids through the Helmet and Bracelet projects than read them another story of a pointless battle of stupid graduates that she use to know. An older woman with gray hair held up in a bun, wearing a simple white blouse, with black slacks crouched down beside a little boy next to Cori.

"Come with me." She asked him quietly, he stood up and followed after her to the back, Cori watching them go as the story started off. The class began and ended relatively quickly as the teacher, Summer stood up sighing, working out a kink in her neck, as she waited for all the annoying children to be picked up. Once the class was empty, she locked up the classroom after herself happily and pulled out her new passcode excitedly. Today she was done being in charge of the tot class and now some other unlucky staff member would have to waste away there for a few weeks; but she on the other hand, was moving up. She tightened her fingers around her passcode happily and rushed out of there. She climbed up two foreign sets of stairs, swiping her passcode at every new doorway and access point she'd never utilized before, noticing her card seemed to be needed at almost every door now. She didn't even want to know what would happen if anyone tried to climb the stair without proper authorization. Summer went to the third floor and her eyes lit up when she saw a desk down the hall, quickly rushing toward it and started to open her mouth but was quickly silenced by the clipboard being slammed down in front of her. She looked down at it, startled, before gathering her senses and picking up the pen and signing in; trying hard to remain unaffected by the cold woman staring her down.

"..." Summer, who usually felt she was a cold person herself, felt chilled by this woman. "Um..I just finished my time teaching a tot class, they promoted me up here to do something called Purge Flash." Summer said uncomfortably. The other woman only continued to stare at her. "...Yeah...can you tell me what it is?" The other woman looked at her wrist watch, typed something in her computer and signaled with a hand for Summer to go in a certain direction. "Right," Summer mumbled. "_Xie xie_" She said nervously, before stepping away from the desk, composing her skirt and going all the way down the hallway where she saw a door to her left that read 'PF'.

"Purge Flash," Summer figured. "Alright." She muttered, knocking anxiously on the door, receiving no response. Confused, she looked at her own watch and raising her hand to knock again when the door, allowing the horrifying sounds of screaming and sobbing out into the hall. She was about to step back when the door opened wider, revealing Mr. Whedon himself, who smiled politely, seeming completely unaffected by the piercing screams emitting from somewhere in the room behind him. at her chuckling at her wide eyes.

"No, no. _Gomen-nasai_, were you frightened?" Mr. Whedon apologized, chuckling at her wide eyes. "Please come-in," He welcomed warmly, gently ushering her in. "I'm glad you made it, Miss... Kayson" He said narrowing his eyes a little to better read her name tag. "You're the addition to the PF division, correct?" She nodded still looking terribly confused as she looked past him and nervously eyed the little girl who was desperately trying to get out of the grip of the man strapping her in to a chair. "Excellent. I wanted you to see this," He said closing the door behind her, making her jump. "We haven't had a new student in a month or so," He continued casually. "And I wanted to make sure you got to see this procedure yourself before handling the cases of other future students. Our last new student I believe was...what was that young boy's name, Mr. Dawson?" Mr. Whedon asked the man who stepped away from the little girl, having finished strapping her down. He looked over at the headmaster thoughtfully.

"...Cori Westoby, I believe sir." The man answered.

"..Y-yes, he's a student in the tot class." Summer mumbled weakly. Mr. Whedon nodded in acknowledge of her response, watching her carefully now to determine whether she'd be able to handle this. Summer hugged her upper arms nervously, watching Mr. Dawson as he went back to the machine next to the little girl." ..Eric Dawson?" Summer finally recognized, looking from the man to the little girl. Eric looked over his shoulder at her more carefully now, frowning.

"_Hai._" He finally conceded, as he pushed a piece of cloth in the little girl's mouth to the already nearly unconscious girl, to keep her quiet. Summer flinched.

"...D-dont you remember me? we were in PE together-"

"_Hai_, I do-but would you politely remember your place and bow before the headmaster, seeing as you disrespectfully forgot to do so upon entering." Eric replied heatedly.

"No need" Mr. Whedon said to Summer kindly, who still appeared to be in shock over what they were doing to the little girl and how different her old classmate now was. "I know this is a bit startling to see at first," Mr. Whedon said sympathetically, as Eric lowered a handle over to the back of the little girl's head tying the straps around the girl's forehead and adjusting needle holder behind her head. "But the results are brilliant." He said passionately. "You see Miss. Kayson, this is the Purge Flash room, affectionately nicknamed PF Room" Mr. Whedon explained, coming closer towards the little girl, crouching before the little one to wipe a stray tear with his thumb, giving her a comforting smile before standing up and lifting a large hand to pat the machine behind the girl. "And this," He said lovingly. "This is what I like to call 'Tasa'."

"Do you know what Tabula Rasa means, Miss. Kayson?" She swallowed keeping her eyes on the needle behind the little girl's head. "It means to start over. Literally, clean slate" He continued, smiling. "It gives the new students at UVA a complete chance to start over, riding them of the knowledge of their previous life. I mean who would like to be plagued with those thoughts?" He asked rhetorically, ignoring as her hand immediately came up to the back of her own head, her mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water. "That's an unnecessary burden I refuse to let our UVA students carry, and yes Miss Kayson, this happened to you as well." He said with a smile, figuring she now had that question in her mind. "It happens to everyone living in this institution." He admitted ruefully, Summer looked at him questioningly. "Except me." He clarified with a chuckle, as he went around the little girl to get back to Summer.

"Is it permanent?" She asked, closing her eyes and rubbing at her forehead as her heart pounded in her ears. She was so confused, so so very confused. He stopped before he got to her, almost as if a little surprised that she'd ask that question, and he clasped his hands calmly in front of himself.

"I do not see how that has any relevance to the job I'm proposing you" He said, eyes slightly narrowed.

"..But why am I-"

"Miss Kayson, the end of this school year is approaching and we will have many more new students for the beginning of the next school year and we need more people working PF Division." He explained. "When those new students are brought, they come here.w" He said signaling behind him toward the chair, Summer gasping and looking away quickly as the needle made contact and the little girls muffled screams were heard. "It's alright," Mr. Whedon assured with a smile. "She'll be alright. They come here, Miss Kayson" He started saying her name a little louder to get back her attention, she looked at him dutifully, receiving a smile for her obedience. "And a Purge Flash is performed, their memories evaporate with this machine" He said. "It's a painful and traumatic procedure that renders the student in a temporary coma, usually for about two weeks." He said. "Then, however, they awaken with a fresh mind for us here at UVA to mold to our liking." He said cheerfully.

"But they're just kids," She mumbled confused, looking back at the little girl who was slumped in her seat now, unconscious.

"..." Mr. Whedon stared right at her, not looking impressed. He almost looked downright disappointed. "...Miss Kayson, we've seen how you've dealt with the tots, you were chosen because it was understood that you held a certain contempt for children." Mr. Whedon said dispassionately, starting to become weary of her righteous demeanor.

"Not like this-" She immediately defended.

"Am I understanding that you are declining the position here in the PF room?" Mr. Whedon asked, tilting his head curiously. She immediately shook her head taking a step back.

"No sir, no." He smiled at that.

"Excellent." Mr. Whedon said stepping beside Summer, and looking over at the little girl from Summer's view. "Don't see this in such a negative light Miss Kayson," He advised, comfortably from beside her. "We are educating these students in a way that the surface is simply incapable of." He said matter-of-factly. "What these kids will do for us one day..." He left hanging in the air, smiling proudly as Eric unstrapped the little girl and scooped up her unconscious form out of the room. "Will make it all worth it." He assured with such strong certainty, it was almost hard not to believe him. Summer quietly went forward, carefully going to the chair that the little girl had just been taken out of, touching it surfaces gently, hesitantly, with a sort of wonder at the machine called 'Tasa'; making sure to memorize every detail of what, in a way, had produced them all; made them reborn.

"I'll give you a chance to look around on your own Miss Kayson," Mr. Whedon interrupted her thoughts. "I have another matter to attend too." Summer looked over at him as he looked down distractedly at a beeper he was holding with a small frown, he raised his head giving her a smile. "The secretary down the hall will show you to your new dormitory section," He added. "Now if you'll excuse me," He requested politely as he exited.

Summer stared at the door he'd just left from for a couple of minutes as the whole situation began to truly dawn on her. She was stuck on this floor now. Their was no way that they'd allow her to go work at any other department because she knew classified information. She closed her eyes, covering them with gently with her hands as she dropped down onto her knees with a groan. She took a minute to fully compose her nerves, before finally allowing her hands to fall onto her lap. She tightened her hands on her knees as she surveyed the room she'd been condemned too for life now - her eyes resting on the machine that had changed all their lives; Tasa.

"..._Ai-ya tyen-ah_" Summer muttered.

* * *

_**Translations:**_

Gorramit (Made up, Firefly) F- word.

Gui (Chinese) Hell.

Jun ta ma yao ming. Joo-ee (Chinese) Watch your back (In a protective manner)

Fang le (Chinese) Crazy, loopy in the head.

ana mamnoon (Arab) I appreciate it.

Hai (Japanese) Yes.

Ohayou (Japanese) Good morning.

Gomen (Japanese)

Gomen-nasai (Japanese) I am (really) sorry.

Go se (Chinese) Crap.

Gorram (Made up, Firefly) F-en.

shu mu? (Chinese) I'm sorry?

Liou coe shway duh biao-tze huh hoe-tze duh burn ur-tze (Chinese) Stupid son of a drooling whore and a monkey

Kekkou desu (Japanese) No thank you!

Iie (Japanese) No.

Xie xie (Chinese) Thank you.

Ai-ya tyen-ah (Chinese) merciless hell.

* * *

**_Next Chapter_**: _"You got Chinese this semester too?" Ruby nodded crinkling her face. _

"_Cantonese and Mandarin aren't as easy as they look.." Ruby said shaking her head as she walked off._

* * *

**Note**: As the chapters progress I hope you guys will notice that I'm starting to use a lot of the same foreign words, hopefully to familiarize you guys with some of the more common words. Sorry for taking so long with an update. I feel bad about the putting in so much info in these chapters but I promise the more interesting stuff will happen soon and I wanted to make this chapter to show the boys and how different they are treated depending on their age group, I just need to get readers back info on the whole school stuff.

One last thing, the little quips interaction that went on between Abel and his Quips teacher wasn't mine, don't own the jokes I got them from a website lol. I'm a horrible punner..

Thank you! Arigatou! Shukran! Merci! Gracias! Grazzi! Danke Schon! Diolch!


	3. Villains and Minions

**Title**: UVA

**Author:** Princess Geta

**Rating:** PG-13

**Disclaimer: **Don't own Sky High or any of it's characters, but UVA and it's character's are mine.

**Summary:** Royal Pain's far fetched idea of creating a Villain Academy may have not been so far fetched after all, one does exist stirring from underneath the earth's surface. For all those that attend the Underground Villain Academy (UVA) hope is nonexistent, cruelness is expected, and a normal life style is unheard of. They live with strict guidelines and go through life waiting to graduate to become Villains. 6 students cant do it anymore and attempt to escape.

**Authors Note:** I would like to thank my two reviewers for the last chapter. **Jess Readin** and **001 ElvenWarrior** for their kind words and helpful advice, which I promise I will try to do. Another thing that was thankfully pointed out to me by Jess Readin was that a word I've often used in this is the word "Gorram" or "Gorramit" Aren't actual Chinese words, which I though they were. They were just made up in a series I watch and adore (Firefly). In any case after much deliberation with myself I've decided to keep it in there just because I really like them to describe the word so I hope no one has any major objections to it. Thanks again!

And as I've said I know it's kind of a lot of information to take in these chapters but anything that's overly confusing go ahead and ask I'll try to clarify it all as much as possible but most of the stuff is going to be explained in the fic itself at some points. Any criticism to helpful suggestions are completely welcome, but please no flames I'm just letting out a weird idea I had.

* * *

**UVA**

_**Chapter 3**_

A pounding headache was the only means to describe what was going on in Lisa's head, she detested this class along with all her other ones she was taking at this time. She was counting down the days until she turned thirteen so she could finally take the more interesting classes.

"Okay, let's review." Mr. Hinker said. "Fifteen seconds Miss Phant, what Domain are humans in?" Ten seconds of a stuttering and anxious groans from the panicked little girl filled the dead silent classroom.

"...I uh..." Mr. Hinker sounded a buzzard and a spray of ice cold water spilled over the girl's head making her cry out in pain. Though not heavily encouraged, learning methods like those were allowed.

"Hopefully that'll wake you up Miss Phant." Mr. Hinker said, rolling his eyes as he continued to pace through the front of the class, glad to notice that all the students sat more upright after seeing what transpired from lack of concentration.

"Miss Morales." Lisa tensed up, her hands fidgeting underneath the table. "The Domain of humans?" He repeated the question.

"..Eukarya, sir." Lisa said hesitantly.

"...Eukarya, are you sure about that Miss. Morales?" Mr. Hinker asked, leaning easily on his desk with his arms crossed, watching her squirm in her seat.

"Yes, sir."

"The Kingdom?" Mr. Hinker asked. She wet her dry lips tapping her foot lightly, drilling her mind to try to rise the information out of the vast essentials UVA had already crammed into her brain.

"Animalia, sir." She finally answered. He nodded and finally turned his attention elsewhere making Lisa sigh in relief, allowing herself to slouch a little. The rest of the class went pretty much without incident and as Lisa left the classroom and made her way through the K-7 bright red halls she continued to mutter about the unfairness of her classes. She finally made her way into the Cafeteria Forum for lunch, arriving there before anyone else apparently had, taking the extra quiet time to rest her head on the table, massaging her temples in an attempt to get rid of her headache.

After a few minutes she heard a worried male voice ask, "You ok?" Abel asked her, as he took a seat across from her. Immediately her head rose up, her face lighting up at the sight of him as she nodded.

"_Hai_, I'm alright. How are you?" She asked, merrily.

"..I'm okay." He assured, with his usual disarming smile. "Tough classes?" He inquired nodding to her in indication of what he'd walked in on, her smile faded a little bit despite her attempts to keep it up, she nodded.

"It's hard." She admitted with a sigh, looking around realizing that with her drained mind she had forgotten to get herself lunch. "I'm going to go get lunch." She said about to stand up.

"Sit." Abel said easily. "Here." He said offering his plate over sympathetically. She sat back down but didn't immediately take the food.

"That's very kind of you Abel," She said blushing. "But I couldn't. I'll go get my own." She assured.

"Don't worry about it." He insisted, shrugging. "I had a big breakfast- give me the celery sticks and well call it even, deal?" He asked, playfully nudging the food slowly towards her, making her laugh as she finally nodded and received it with a bright blush staining her cheeks.

"_Xie xie." _She said shyly.

"So what class did you come out of?" He asked conversationally as he bit a celery stick.

"Issues in science," She said, wrinkling her nose. He nodded understandingly with a smile.

"Yeah, they're pretty tough." He remembered. "You don't have Mr. Hink, do you?" He asked.

"Yeah." Abel groaned, leaning back.

"Man, he is the absolute worst! _Gomen, _little one." He said with a sympathetic smile.

"I just don't get why they force so much on us so quickly." She said shaking her head.

"They try to teach you almost everything academic wise before you turn thirteen; math, science, language arts so that when you finally do turn thirteen they can have you focus on more Villain based classes," He explained. "Human Anatomy, Quips, Weaponry, Language Arts Creative Writing Villain Speeches, PT, PA, PE, PP." He named off on his fingers. Lisa arched a brow at that last one.

"PP?" She asked having heard of all of them except for the last one he mentioned. He shrugged.

"I don't know, I don't even doubt it's coming," He joked smiling, trying to cheer her up.

"...Abel, you do know that when you say that in Spanish it sounds like-"

"Yes, yes I know" He said chuckling. "Ignore I said that."

She smiled, distracted. "I just feel like my brain is so flooded with all the information they're trying to put in there and I don't know how much more I can fit, you know? I wish I was thirteen already," She said sighing.

"Bite your tongue." Jordan said annoyed as he sat down beside Abel. "_Baka_ little girl," Jordan commented with a shake of his head. "You don't know what you're talking about- turning thirteen was when hell opened it's doors for me and rolled out the carpet." Jordan grumbled.

"But at least you get a formal title and everything!" She argued. "Right now we're just underclassmen till we turn thirteen."

"Who cares, it's just a title" Paige said reasonably, sitting down on Abel's other side smiling as he tapped her nose affectionately and reached to take Cori out of her arms, whom she gladly handed over, shooting a grateful look towards her Au Fait who winked her. "Definitely not worth all the painful classes you have to take," Paige added to her former statement, as she reached over and took a celery stick from Abel who glared at her.

"Please" Lisa said rolling her eyes, in both annoyance at her comments and the back and forth interaction between Abel and Paige. "You can't compare your classes to Abel's or Jordan's," Lisa argued. "They're both Villains, you're just a Minion."

"That's _luh-suh_ and you know it," Paige jeered, defensively. "Being a Villain or Minion doesn't affect you till your last three weeks of Senior year."

"Spoken like a truly worthless s_ha gua-" _

"Hey!" Abel hollered angrily, surprised at how quickly the conversation had become an argument between the two girls; it was nothing new, but damn if it wasn't getting old. "That is enough." Abel warned, his eyes narrowing specifically at Lisa who started it, she immediately saw that she was blamed and her eyes widened in disbelief her mouth opening in outrage.

"This is such a bunch of _go se..._" She hissed, standing up furiously, pushing the plate Abel had given her away and glaring daggers at Paige; he ALWAYS defended her, she thought, angry at how this had all turned out. Her headache was now pounding more than ever as she stormed off, walking out of the forum and down a few hallways filled with classes waiting for the bell to ring so she could go to her next class. Lisa ignored the rumbling her stomach was producing from not having eaten as she leaned on a wall, waiting. She did a double take when she saw Ruby walking beside her guardian in one direction and she pushed away from the wall going towards them.

"Hi Ms. Grummon," She quickly greeted, coming to stand in front of them with a polite smile. "Do you mind if I walk with Ruby? we have the same class next." Ms. Grummon glanced at Ruby and nodded.

"Sure, I have a meeting I have to get too anyway." The older woman replied, giving Ruby a small wave before walking off. Lisa waited until the teacher was gone before she grabbed Ruby's arm and ushered her in the other direction.

"Lisa..?" Ruby asked confused. "We don't have our next class together.."

"Not till Villain History. I know." Lisa said waving it off. "But I needed to vent with somebody, it's kind of pointless to do it with you since you're her super Minion worshipper-but I don't care at this point!" Lisa nearly shouted, veering off to the side and leaning against the wall as she tried to get a hold of her anger.

"What happened?" Ruby asked gently, tilting her head confused.

"Nothing, Abel took her side again." Lisa said rolling her eyes. "I was only telling the truth you know," She said annoyed. "She is a _gorram_ Minion, all I did was point it out and I get harassed for it." She said shaking her head. "Ooooh bad me I told the pointless mind reader that she's a minion, take me to the black room for punishment." Lisa sarcastically mocked, hanging both her arms above her head to mimic punishment. She put her hands down rolling her eyes. "Abel's a Villain, Jordan's a Villain, I'm going to be a Villain when I'm power placed, she was placed as a Minion! you'll be a Minion when you're power placed, none of this is new information, Ruby! so why don't I get to point out the super obvious?-ugh! I just don't get it, why the _gui_ does he-" Lisa clenched her jaw, eyes watering. "I'm more powerful than she is, you know." Lisa pointed out desperately. "At Destroy the Hero, I would wipe the floor with her." Lisa exhaled tiredly, her rant running out of steam when she noticed her audience didn't seem to fully follow along. She glanced lazily at the always attentive little girl and chuckled as she leaned back on the wall. "Too bad she'll be graduated by the time I get power placed huh?" She asked, smiling. "Or hey maybe I'll get lucky, maybe she'll fail all her classes and become UVA Staff, then she can become the gym teacher and I'll accidentally-" The bell rang. Lisa sighed, rubbing her face miserably, trying to work up the energy for her next class. "Forget it." She told Ruby shaking her head as she pushed herself gently off the wall. "Just get to class Ruby, I'll see you in sixth period."

"What do you have now?" Ruby asked.

"Geometry." Lisa said groaning. "It's so hard Ruby, take my advice." She said grabbing Ruby's shoulders so she'd face her. "Don't grow up, ever, it's a curse. Just stay like this." She said patting her shoulders. Ruby nodded smiling.

"You don't want me to grow up?" Ruby asked amused.

"No. You stay just like this forever, okay?" Lisa asked, unable to help herself but to chuckle at the large grin reflected on the little happy girl, actually feeling a little better. "What do you have next?" Lisa asked with a smile.

"Japanese" Ruby said with a light shrug. "It's not so hard I guess, but I think I'd learn it faster if they'd teach me one language at a time" Lisa grinned.

"You got Chinese this semester too?" Ruby nodded crinkling her face.

"Cantonese and Mandarin aren't as easy as they look.." Ruby said shaking her head as she walked off down the hallway, pausing when she saw Jordan coming down the hallway.

She automatically ducked her head down and veered off more to the side, hoping to avoid him. Around the others he was still somewhat of a bully towards her but when they were alone he was absolutely merciless with her. She just didn't understand what it was that she did to him to make him hate her so much for. She let out a breath that she was holding once he'd passed and turned her head back to watch him go; though he teased her like their was no tomorrow, their was a huge part of her that wanted his acceptance more than anything in the world and she told herself continuously that she'd get it someday. She smiled, always feeling more comforted by that thought, as she entered her class and got to her seat - struggling a little to get up on it - as she looked down at the sheet of Japanese symbols that she was suppose to translate with an unhappy sigh.

After an hour or so Ruby asked to be excused to go to the restroom, muttering Japanese phrases to herself softly, with her eyebrows crinkled in concentration as she walked through the halls towards the facilities. She entered the restroom distracted as she went to the lower sink and washing her hands, then glancing back at the bathroom stalls before smiling at herself and going to the restroom realizing she'd forgotten the entire reason for going to the restroom. She came back out and washed her hands once more, before going to the door; before she could open it to exit, it opened from the other side, as Ruby stepped back, surprised to see Paige about to come-in. Paige momentarily stopped as well before giving her a smile and going to the sinks to wash off her hands.

"Hey Ruby," Paige greeted gently looking over at the girl who came back in to wait for her, smiling shyly up at her.

"Hi."

"Where you coming from?" Paige asked kindly.

"Japanese." Ruby answered, both girls turning when a light skinned girl with short blonde hair and gray eyes entered the restroom.

"Heidi," Paige greeted with a soft smile. "How are you?" She'd been introduced to Heidi by Abel who was a close friend of her Au Fait and secret boyfriend, Ruben.

"Hey girls, how you doing?" Heidi asked back, receiving two nods as she went into a stall.

"I should go, I could get in trouble for taking too long." Ruby said shyly up to Paige who nodded, stroking the girls soft hair, always being amazed by the silky feel of it.

"Ok, study hard, kiddo." Ruby nodded excusing herself and leaving.

"Cute kid, your tyro?" Heidi asked as she came back out and went to wash her hands.

"No, no- no tyro's for me." Paige said smiling as she took a towel and dried off her hands. "Where are you coming from?"

"Weight Training." Heidi said shaking her head. "It's unbearable right now. How do they expect me to carry weights in the same day as being tortured?" Heidi asked rhetorically.

"You mean PT?" Paige asked sympathetically.

"Yeah, I have it with Jordan." Heidi said sighing, as she looked at herself in the mirror there. "Honestly, I don't know why they make us do that and I hate to see placement students like Jordan in there. I mean as if their wasn't enough drama and trouble when you start your Placement year, you know?"

Placement Year was nothing more than putting a name for the 8th grade; instead of a typical High School system that had the years Freshman through Senior year they added one more to make it five, and called it Placement year. Students were put in Placement year when they passed all the necessary classes and turned thirteen. The first and most important thing that was done in Placement year was the Power Placement Test itself, where it was decided whether a student's powers were impressive enough to eventually make them a worthy Villain, or a simple Minion instead. At the end of their schooling Villains would be released to the surface world with his or her own Minion at their side.

"Its hard." Paige agreed. Heidi nodded drying her hands off thoughtfully.

"You know, Jordan's really lucky that Abel stayed another year here. Knowing how he is, his record," Heidi shook her head. "I don't know what Jordan would be like now without Abel, you know?" Paige nodded, looking at her through the mirror.

"_Hai._" Paige mumbled in acknowledgement. "I think it's a thought that's crossed all our minds."

"Personally I think he did it on purpose." Heidi said smiling. "But then Abel's just like that, right?"

"What, not graduate on his senior year on purpose?" Paige asked incredulously.

All students were suppose to graduate their senior year but for those that were a little slow to catch up with their credits they were given ONE year only to make up their classes and qualify for graduation. This extra year that was given to them that needed it, was referred to as Over Time, so the students in this grade were quickly nicknamed OT Seniors. Abel being one of them but as it was already known, those that failed to meet their requirements after their OT Senior year were drafted as Staff of some sort for UVA.

"...He might have." Paige conceded with a frown, unconsciously biting her lower lip as she thought more about this possibility she'd never considered, before eventually shaking her head. "But I don't think he did. Its not a smart thing to do."

"Abel doesn't do the smart thing, Paige, that's why he has so much trouble around here." Heidi reminded. "He tends to do _lo que le dice el corazon._" Heidi reminded with some amusement at the other girls naïve thought process over his extra year there. "You're very lucky to have him." She said matter-of-factly.

"Me nor Jordan deny that." Paige said grinning. "You too, you and Ruben get along pretty well, don't you?" Paige asked genuinely as she made her way to the door, not wanting to be any later to class. Heidi froze, looking at her through the mirror, wondering if Abel had ever told either of his tyro's of the secret relationship that Heidi and Ruben had; seeing no hint of ridicule or devious intent, she finally nodded, hesitantly.

"…Yeah, we get along all right." She said with an unsure smile as Paige nodded and waved her a goodbye before exiting the bathroom and going back down another two hallways before entering her Extra Curricular Foreign Language class; but before she could get to her seat, Paige was given a note by her teacher that said she was to go to her coordinators office. She bit her lip nervously as she left the classroom again reading the note over and over hoping that it would suddenly tell her what this was all about. The strange things that had been happening these last couple of days made her afraid about what they could possibly want from her now. She entered the Coordinators office and took a seat after talking to the secretary briefly. They had seven coordinators at UVA that were in charge of meeting with students on occasion to talk to them about their grades and classes. The first coordinator dealt with students that had a last name that began with the letter A-D, then the second for E-H, the third for I-L, the fourth for M-P, the fifth for Q-T, the sixth for U-X, and finally the seventh coordinator was for students whose last names began with Y-Z.

"Reynolds," The secretary pointed a thumb at the office behind her. "Crume will see you now." Paige nodded getting out of her seat and going to the office door knocking politely, despite the door being open. Ms. Crume gave her a brief nod before signaling her to close the door and offering her a seat. Paige did so nervously, looking at the slightly chubby woman with dark hair and hazel eyes.

"Mr. Whedon asked me to have this meeting with you" Ms. Crume explained, noticing the girl sit up straighter at the mention of the headmaster's name. "He's met up with you before, regarding a temporary tot guardianship, right?" Ms. Crume asked as she looked through a few papers to make sure she had the information right.

"_Hai_, ma'am, he did." Paige acknowledged politely.

"How is that working for you?" Ms. Crume asked. Paige could feel the question had simply been a polite one and nodded in response.

"It's going fine, thank you."

Just as she'd expected, her counselor never even bothered to look up for the answer to her question."Excellent."Ms. Crume said simply, flipping through a couple pages. "Well, you're a mind reader, correct, Paige?" She asked, finally glancing up; Receiving a nod, Ms. Crume continued with a smile, folding her hands together on the table.

"The reason why we're meeting here today, Paige is to discuss your future as a Minion. By the looks of it, your grades are pretty good and you could move on to be some Super Villain's Minion but if we're truly going to be honest here, what can you really do once you get to the surface, Paige?" She asked frankly. "You've got what is considered a mediocre power here." She said, gesturing towards the paper work. "No Villain is likely going to take your help too seriously and you would probably be abandoned by him or her once they settle on the surface." Ignoring the girl's flinch, her counselor continued. "However, because of Mr. Whedon's gifted mind a better alternative has come up for kids with your power." Ms. Crume said, with more enthusiasm now. "He wants You to become an assistant of his. Many times people need to be interrogated for him, whether it be on the surface or down here, more likely than not we both know that people try to lie their way through it. How is Mr. Whedon suppose to know if lies are being spun up? He needs help with these bad people, Paige. He needs your help. What do you say? After graduation, you can stay here, in what is considered one of the most envied job positions, right at Mr. Whedon's side. Will you think about it?" Paige looked at her lap thoughtfully fiddling with her hands that rested there, thinking. Thinking about what had happened a few days before- With Abel cursing the institution.

* * *

"_she didn't just die while trying to escape, they did it, they caught her and they killed her for it, it was those tyen-sah duh UH-muo-!_"

* * *

With Jordan in PT.

* * *

_"I saw you in strap down." Jordan looked up at that, surprised, while Abel grin faded into a frown. This was the first time this had happened, they usually made a big effort to avoid seeing each other in most classes because they didn't want to see each other hurt._

* * *

And what Lisa had told her this morning.

* * *

_"Please" Lisa said rolling her eyes. "You cant compare your classes to Abel's or Jordan's" Lisa argued. "They're both Villains, you're just a Minion."_

* * *

Paige raised her eyes to meet her coordinators, finally nodding slowly.

"I knew you'd agree" Ms. Crume said nodding. "It's a great opportunity and you should feel very fortunate to have it. In any case, Mr. Whedon himself will be calling you out of a class in the near future to further discuss this matter and get your final decision, but I'm assuming he's going to get no opposition from you, right?"

"_Hai _ma'am, it sounds like a great idea." Paige said sighing, with a tired smile. She'd heard rumors of Mr. Whedon looking for mind readers but she'd never really thought of herself as a possible candidate, but here she was - being offered - what was considered by many others - as a very esteemed position. Ms. Crume was right, it was a much better opportunity than she could have ever hoped for, to work side by side with Mr. Whedon himself. What more could a girl like her ask for? It would be great. She wouldn't have to worry about the future, the Academy would continue to take care of her, undoubtedly for the rest of her life.

It would be... great.

* * *

**Translations:**

Hai (Japanese) Yes.

Xie-Xie (Chinese) Thank you.

Gomen (Japanese) sorry.

Baka (Japanese) stupid.

Luh-suh (Chinese) Garbage.

Sha gua (Chinese) Fool.

Go se (Chinese) Crap.

Gorram (Made up, Firefly) F-en.

Gui (Chinese) Hell.

Lo que le dice el corazon (Spanish) What his heart tells him.

* * *

**Next Chapter**: _"Theirs two groups of two, they have three minutes to defeat their opponents and get to a button beside the Hero that's dangling from a chain over a tank" Paige explained. "When somebody presses the button, the hero goes into the tank, those villains win" _

* * *

**Note**: THANK GOD! I have to admit, this one was kind of rushed and a drag to make because I just wanted to add last bits of info about the school and needed a chapter for it. It is done now though so I think I can say that after this chapter their should be less info if any to take in and more plain events happening to the six runaways. One more thing, the information on here about humans and kingdoms and stuff like that I absolutely have no idea if this was accurate, I half heartedly googled so I'm not sure. I apologize if anything is wrong :) Thanks everyone for the patience and for the reviews.

**Thank you! Arigatou! Shukran! Merci! Gracias! Grazzi! Danke Schon! Diolch!**


	4. metamorphisis

**Title**: UVA

**Author:** Princess Geta

**Rating:** PG-13

**Disclaimer: **Don't own Sky High or any of it's characters, but UVA and it's character's are mine.

**Summary:** Royal Pain's far fetched idea of creating a Villain Academy may have not been so far fetched after all, one does exist stirring from underneath the earth's surface. For all those that attend the Underground Villain Academy (UVA) hope is nonexistent, cruelness is expected, and a normal life style is unheard of. They live with strict guidelines and go through life waiting to graduate to become Villains. 6 students cant do it anymore and attempt to escape.

**Authors Note:** I wanted to thank my one review, J**ess Readin**, Thank you!

Anything overly confusing go ahead and ask I'll try to clarify it all as much as possible but most of the stuff is going to be explained in the fic itself at some points. Any criticism to helpful suggestions are completely welcome, but please no flames I'm just letting out a weird idea I had.

* * *

**UVA**

**Chapter 4**

"I'm always late now." Paige muttered in complaint, frowning up at the sign over the wide double set of doors that read 'Gymnasium' over it; Making a face at the doors, she pushed them open without another thought, entering the enormous room. "Too bad Abel couldn't bring you today.." She mumbled more to herself, glancing at Cori in her arms, who clearly heard her and gave her a resentful look. Paige ignored the look momentarily as she made large strides across the gym, not wanting anyone's thoughts to invade her mind. "_Gomen._" She apologized after a moment, quickly beginning to feel guilty. "You're not a bad kid at all, Cori but-" Paige stopped a few feet away from the entrance to the tot's class; at the doorway was the rude staff memember who had escorted her when she went to get Cori for the first time; Hank, if she recalled correctly.

Hank gestured wildly as he spoke with his good buddy, AJ, with his back turned partly towards them - unaware of the new arrivals - but AJ saw them and smiled in welcome; Catching the smile that had nothing to do with the story he was in the middle of sharing, Hank glanced over his shoulder and did a double take at what he saw, a large grin forming on his face as he turned eagerly to face Paige. Paige frowned, looking at he ground as she adjusted Cori on her hip, unhappily, having hoped he hadn't recognized her.

"_Konichiwa._" Hank greeted joyously, looking entirely much too amused to see the girl again. "Sorry, I'd greet you with some fancy Welsh saying, but I can't really say I took any extra curricular languages." He remarked with narrowed eyes, his smile widening into a slow smirk as she cringed; satisfied, he let his gaze wander down from the girl to the boy in her arms, and his eyes lit up with recognition.

"Hey AJ, there's a clipboard right there, get it for me will you buddy?" Hank requested, without taking his eyes off the girl, smirk firmly in place. AJ took the clipboard on the desk nearby and handed it to Hank, incredibly confused as to how Hank knew this student. Hank briefly thanked AJ, tilting his head in amusement at the small glare the girl was giving him. "So who do we have here?" He asked playfully.

"..." Paige looked hesitantly at the child. "Cori.." She finally admitted. He flipped through a few papers.

"Westoby?" He asked receiving a nod in reply, looking the other way. "Temporary student Guardian; Paige Reynolds, status: Minion." Hank read out loud chuckling. "Things are finally looking up AJ!" Hank exclaimed, only receiving an eyebrow raise from his friend. "And here I thought this child interviewing gig was going to be boring," Hank continued, undeterred by his friends quiet nature, as he handed the clipboard back to AJ who held out his hand and took it back. Hank's gaze lingered on AJ's UVA Logo tattoo which AJ had put on the inside of his wrist, remembering AJ having told him once that he wanted it somewhere different than where UVA students typically put their tattoo.

As a 'present' from UVA students were allowed to have the UVA logo tattooed somewhere on their body after they'd been at UVA for ten years or more and most people had theirs on their arm on their back somewhere but not AJ, which Hank found incredibly amusing. He himself hid his tattoo on his rear end, not really wanting to display, what felt, like an ownership stamp. Hank smiled back at Paige, momentarily wondering if she had one, before sarcastically offering his arms to the child she was holding - and for the first time since Paige got Cori - she was hesitant to hand him over. "You're going to have to hand him over, little girl." He reminded, with a grin. Cori simply smiled up at Paige who swallowed nervously and handed him over, quickly crossing her arms. "Hello there little guy," Hank cooed, raising Cori to his eye level, absolutely loving how miserable he was making this girl.

_I should give you some very special treatment kid, just to get under your girl's skin - _the thought invaded Paige's mind, making her gasp.

"You better not," She warned without thinking. Hank arched a brow curiously, what the heck was that about? was she was threatening him? "_Iie_!" She quickly shouted, cringing. "No I'm not-I just mean - please don't be mean to him because I'm his guardian-" Hank looked over at AJ, who shared his curious look, he took a step back and reached for the clipboard once more and flipped to the page that Hank had been looking at before.

"Paige Reynods, Mind Reader." AJ read aloud, noting Hanks confusion melted away, leaving his grin back in place.

"Good." Hank shrugged. "Means I don't have to tell you what I think of you," Hank said with a slight sneer. "And, of course, that'll mean extra special attention for this little guy. Don't worry, you go on ahead to class little girl, I'll take particular care of your little tot for the rest of the week." He assured, all pretenses of friendliness gone. "Bye now." He insisted, coldly, shooing her away. Paige took a step back, hesitantly, looking miserably between Hank to AJ and running off, after a moment.

After the girl was a good distance away, AJ turned to AJ, shaking his head."You're one messed up man, Hank." AJ remarked, as Hank smiled at him in reply.

"Oh I'm bluffing AJ, you know that -if you didn't you would have argued with me right in front of the girl." Hank shot back, receiving a smile. They took Cori in and set him on the carpet along with the other kids, hanging back the door to sign in anyone else coming in.

"So what's with the girl - what'd she do to irriate you so much?" AJ asked, curious.

"All the brats in here are snobs who turn their nose up at us, AJ - I'm just making sure I get to have some fun too." Hank said cooly, glancing towards the gymnasium entrance. "Sign in the next few brats on your own for a minute, will you? I'm going to make sure I get assigned to the kid we just got in." AJ nodded, waiting with his shoulder on the doorway casually, giving the teenage girl who approached with her own tot, a smile.

"_Konichiwa_" AJ greeted. "Who is this?"

"Kimberly Hart." the girl replied, stumbling slightly forward. AJ looked up from from his sheet, surprised.

"You alright?" He asked. She nodded and straightening up in front of the staff member.

"Yes sir, its just a headache." She admitted. "It's been on me all day and it won't go away." She said, pressing on one side of her head, miserably.

AJ nodded sympathetically, "You seen the nurse about it?" She shook her head.

"No, I don't have the time." She mumbled, eyes closed as she rubbed at her left temple. "I'm running late as it is, practically all the time. Its my senior year and I'm rushing to finish all these last minute credits with the end of the year coming up so that I can graduate," She explained, crouching a little and rubbing her tot's back briefly before gently shaking her head as she nodded for the little girl to go ahead into the class giving him a grateful smile, having suddenly realized she'd just been venting to a superior staff member. _Go seichō arigatōgozaimashita_." She mumbled in embarassment- turning away to leave.

AJ looked back at the desk, hesitantly, then back at her. "Hold on. I got something for it" He assured, going to the desk where Hank was finishing signing a paper as the overhead bell rang.

After all the teachers and staff finished settling down the children on the carpeted circle, they began explaining the same way they did every day, what they would be doing for class. "You know who you're going to interview?" Hank asked AJ conversationally, as the two men leaned back against one of the back tables.

"No, I think I'll just go down the list- you know, the way we're supposed too." AJ said teasingly, receiving a grin.

"Suit yourself, grandpa." Hank replied, stepping forward and deftly making his way to the young Cori as the new teacher separated them into small groups for a class exercise. Cori went with him without complaint, smiling happily as Hank lifted him up onto the table and sat on a wooden chair in front of him and studied him with amusement. "You already seem a lot easier to get along with than your guardian, kid, congratulation." Hank tilted his head as the boy stared back with a larger smile than before- almost seeming like he empathized with what he was saying. Hank waited another moment, almost expecting the child to formulate a coherent reply back to his observation but when he received no response, he began to feel silly. "How old are you anyway, kid?" Hank muttered, embarrassed, as he picked up the boys chart. "Four years old." Hank laughed, shaking his head. "It says here you may be mute - is that true, boy? are you mute?" Hank asked, studying Cori closely who gave him a look that said, 'Really? How do you expect me to answer that?' Hank let out another bark of laughter and immediately quieted when he received a warning from another staff member from nearby.

Hank leaned conspiringly close, "You've been here less than fifteen minutes and you're already getting me in trouble," He accused. "I should dump you back with the other brats before you cause me any more trouble, shouldn't I?" Cori only continued to grin and Hank chuckled dryly as he leaned back. "So I don't suppose there's any point in talking to you about your super-powers, is there?" Cori shrugged and Hank imitated the motion, grinning. "That's it huh? a shrug...you're a tough nut to crack, kid - I'll give you that -but even a kid like you comes with a price though, can I bribe you with apple juice?" Cori's eyes lit up at the idea and Hank went to go get it. Hank went ahead and put the straw in the boxed apple juice and set it on the table, pushing it towards the boy with amusement.

Another thirty minutes passed by and just as Hank had suspected, he had been duped. The boy wasn't saying a thing; Hank had even offered him a pencil and paper at some point and had gotten him to draw a picture of what appeared to be a sun shinning down on a house and family of three but never mentioned or displayed his powers. "...You could legitimately not have a power, I suppose." Hank mumbled to himself with a frown, not wanting to even think about what that would mean for the kid if the institution had taken him in and later came to find that it had been a waste. He looked up from his musing to find Cori still happily sucking on what little was left of his juice as he looked around and studied the class. Hank exhaled, throwing his arms in the air, grinning. "You win - I give up kid, you're good. I don't know any more about you than I did when we started. How's a bathroom break sound to you - that was an awful lot of juice you had there." Cori nodded and Hank automatically took his hand and helped the boy hop down. "Wait." Hank demanded, turning to look down at Cori. "You DO know how to do THAT on your own, right?" Cori rolled his eyes with a smile and walked past him towards the bathroom door that was attached to the classroom. "What?" Hank asked as he followed after him past the door. "That's a valid question." Cori only gave him a, 'Yeah, right' look as he went straight to a stall, leaving a perturbed Hank who studied the miniature bathroom; everything here was sized for the tots and Hank wrinkled his nose at the small size of it all as he went to another stall to go take care of his own business, complaining about the tiny accommodations.

A minute or two later Hank came back out and went straight to the small sink and washed his hands, looking himself over as he blindly ran his hand underneath the paper dispenser to grab a towel to dry his hands off; instead his hand came back empty, with the exception of a bleeding graze he'd managed to obtain from the sharp edges of the dispenser that were used to tear off the individual sheets. Hank cursed underneath his breath, glancing down at the boy who came up beside him and quietly climbed the little steps - reaching over to wash his hands - as he looked over at Hank curiously.

"What, you find this funny?" Hank asked, his mood soured, as he put his hands angrily under the spray of water to wash off the running blood. He brought the flesh wound up to his face to study it, annoyance flashing into his eyes as he put it underneath the spray of water again, angry that it was still bleeding; if he needed to get stitches for a stupid cut he'd gotten from the little boys restroom he was never going to live it down. "Why the hell would they make dispensers in here so sharp?" He asked rhetorically, wiping at his hand pointlessly. Not having noticed him coming closer, Cori took Hank by surprise when he cupped his own small hand around the outside of Hanks injured hand. "What-" Hank pulled away quickly. "Stop that, kid." He roughly chastised, annoyed. The little boy insistently grabbed at his hand again - with both of his hands this time - and studied the wound, gently touching the edges o the jagged cut with his own small fingertips. Hanks eyes began to widen to the size of saucers as his cut began to heal right in front of him - his eyes rapidly shifted from the boy to his hand, as his mind raced a thousand miles per hours with the possibilities.

Hank had found a healer-talk about a bonus!

Hank whooped as he picked the little boy up, holding him close to his side, unable to wipe the seemingly permanent grin on his face as he deliberated the best course of action to take. Should he take Cori directly to the White Room and inform them or go to the Main Office and request an audience with Mr. Whedon himself? now wouldn't that be something...UVA adored healers, they were always in demand and he just knew he'd be compensated generously for the find. "Wait until AJ hears about this.." Hank said gleefully, wondering what all he could request for, while he led the boy out of the bathroom; entering the main classroom to find two black suited staff members escorting a struggling AJ out of the classroom. Hanks grin immediately faded to a confused frown as Cori back down on the ground. "Go with the others." He ordered quietly, as he took large strides towards the door- closing the door quickly behind him.

"Excuse me," He called loudly. "Is there something I can assist you, gentlemen with?" He asked them, voice etched with confusion. The two suited men, turned briefly to look at him, one having already pointed a revolver at Hank who immediately raised his hands up.

"If you take one further step in our direction, you will be eliminated on the spot - is that clear?" Hank nodded quickly.

"Absolutely." He assured, eyes lingering on AJ whose mouth was muffled by the hand of the silent suit, eyes wild and panicked. "But why.."

"No one is allowed to administer medication to students without the expressed permission of a Nurse, or Mr. Whedon himself- Mr. Welling here, as well as all UVA staff are not exempt from this rule, he knows this." The man holding AJ's mouth closed explained coldly, hand squeezing around AJ's face when AJ struggling increased.

"Excuse us," The man requested.

"_Wo qui qui nile_, please wait for just- couldn't there be a mistake?" Hank implored, heart pounding in his ears.

"Camera." The first said, easily as he pointed a thumb to classroom.

"It w-was only one, Hank." AJ sputtered, managing to shake off the hand around his mouth, blood on his cheeks from the nails of the man holding him. "She had a headache and I know what that's-I j-just felt bad and gave her one-" One clear hit to the back of AJ's neck was all it took and his best friend fell limp in their hold.

"Excuse us." The first man asked with finality, giving Hank a look that told him if he did otherwise, there would fatal repercussions. Hank licked his quickly chapping lips, taking a few slow steps backward-unable to take his eyes away from his best friend until he had been removed completely from the Gymnasium. Hank didnt react when he stumbled back onto the closed classroom door. What the hell had just happened? Face as pale as a ghost and with his hands shaking Hank went back into the classroom, avoiding the curious stares of all the eyes there as he made his way back to the large Desk he had previously seen AJ sorting through. Hank sat down heavily and opened the first drawer on the left, leafing through it briefly find no pills; when Hank closed that one up, he moved on the the drawer on the right and immediately saw it. He picked up the small white bottle and brought it up to his face, finding it hard to read suddenly-he intently focused on the red and white title and finally managed to make out that it was Tylenol.

His jaw clenched viciously, nostrils flaring rapidly, struggling to keep control as a shaking hand came up to run through his hair; His gaze fell back down on the plastic piece-of-crap bottle he was squeezing in his other fist. Those _Ta ma de hundan_ took his best friend to do - who the hell knew what - too all because of pill? a _gorram_ Tylenol pill?

Past him, the children on the carpeted circle attempted to repeat together the names of some of the most important Villains in History, an exercise that was being completely ignored by Cori, who only eyed the back of the classroom with concern; where a profusely sweating Hank dropped his head, his arms and shoulders occasionally trembling but taut as a bow string pulled back as far as it could be pulled- and ready to fire.

...

"Hey." Abel greeted with a smile as Paige came to sit at their usual table, where their gang was all sitting and eating their lunches.

"_Wei_" Paige said in a happy greeting. She had just picked up Cori from gym-tot class and was incredibly relieved not to have found Hank there waiting for her to a jerk again.

"Everything ok today?" Abel asked, knowing she had started to get use to him taking Cori to class and feeling bad for being unable to do so today, due to being kept up by Mr. O'Breno in Quips.

"Yeah, everything's good, right Cori?" Paige asked her tot, still a little concerned that Hank may have kept good on his promise. Cori only offered a small smile in reply. Paige nodded, turning back to Abel with a more reassured smile, "Yup. You?"

"Of course, all is good."

"Good." Paige repeated, somewhat shyly, always a little overwhelmed when Abel gave her his undiluted attention.

"...Now that we've established that all is 'good' can I have your broccoli Abel?" Jordan finally asked, confused. Abel glanced at him, then down at the plate that his youngest tyro was pointing at, and he nodded with an easy chuckle.

"Go ahead." He assured, nudging the plate his way, Jordan nodded with a grin.

"Excellenttt." He cackled, taking it all. Paige suddenly remembered it wasn't just them three at the table and blinked over at Lisa, immediately noticing the girl was looking away, apparently still upset over the other day; sweet Ruby, however, was contentedly sitting beside Lisa, giving Paige a bright and reassuring smile that Paige couldn't help but return.

"We're barely starting Destroy the Hero tomorrow, when you guys doing it?" Jordan asked Paige curiously, when he noticed that no one was going to offer up any conversation. Paige looked at him.

"We already did it this year but we're doing it again today, I think actually." She said, with a shrug.

"I know you're against it and all Abel," Jordan started, carefully trying to mask his anticipation. "...But I'm kind of excited about it." He admitted.

Abel chuckled, "It's alright," He assured. "To tell you the truth, I guess it was pretty cool to watch people duke it out." Abel conceded.

"Did you ever get picked?" Jordan asked, grinning - thankful that the topic wasn't off limits.

"Yeah, three times." Abel offered up.

"And?" Jordan asked eagerly.

"Won twice, lost once. They stopped letting me play because I had a bit of an unfair disadvantage." Jordan nodded, grin showing the pride he felt for his Au Fait.

"What about you Paige?" Lisa asked with an impish smile. "How many times have you won?"

"None." Paige said honestly with a smile, knowing very well what Lisa was trying to do.

"I imagine that's for a reason," Lisa started calmly, trying to hide her smile as she played with her food. "I mean what good could it do you to read someone's mind when you're fighting with someone?" She asked rhetorically.

"Actually it's probably of pretty good use." Abel countered with a easy shrug. "You can anticipate your opponents moves before they make them."

"Yeah, but what good is it to know what your opponents going to do if you cant defend yourself against them." Lisa argued.

"I don't know, Lisa.." Abel drawled with a smile, putting a confident arm around Paige's shoulders. "I wouldn't count her out because of that, she's done well for herself in PE against students who have more physical powers than she does." He said proudly, smiling at Paige who rolled her eyes at the attention, blushing as she looked the other way.

"Have to agree with him there, actually." Jordan said with a nod. Lisa gave a small roll of the eyes, forgetting how useless this battle was.

"Ok fine..." She waved off. "I've heard about the tank in there but I don't get to go in there so I wonder what's in there-I mean there is a tank, right?.." She asked Abel, somewhat, confused. Gym was only something they got to experience when they were in Powers Education (PE) and of course, all of that was when they turned thirteen. "How does that game work anyway?"

"Theirs two groups of two, they have three minutes to defeat their opponents and get to a button beside the Hero that's dangling from a chain over a tank." Paige explained. "When somebody presses the button, the hero goes into the tank, those villains win." Paige finished, offering Cori up his own juice but being rejected.

"What's in the tank?" Ruby asked, confused.

"Nobody knows" Paige answered, attention now on Cori as she offered him some peas.

"And if nobody presses the button?" Jordan asked, eagerly.

"The hero gets whisked away to safety." Paige answered, chuckling at the raspberry noise Jordan made in disapproval.

"Do they use real people?" Ruby asked fearfully.

Paige glanced at the little girl and offered her a reassuring smile, "Not usually, most of the time it's a dummy but..." Paige wrinkled her nose. "Sometimes when they can, they've used Heroes in the past." Paige replied honestly, shaking her head at the thought. "But I haven't seen them do it."

"You seen them Abel?" Jordan asked Abel, who tapped Cori's nose playfully, noticing the little guys mood was off.

"Eat your chicken strips, they're getting cold." Abel instructed his youngest tyro, who obediently did so knowing better than to insist on a topic that Abel didn't want to talk about. Paige clearly got the hint too because she quietly continued to try to feed Cori.

"..You know.." Jordan started carefully, keeping his eyes on his Au Fait. "I don't like it for the hero thrown in the tank or anything, I just like the idea of being able to battle someone and be able to use our powers." Abel ruffled Jordan's hair with a hand with a smile that told him he understood what he meant.

"You guys want to hear a joke Mr. O'Breno told us today?" Abel asked his pack who groaned mortified at what he'd tell them now, they'd heard some pretty pathetic stuff in the past. "No, this one will tickle you, I promise." He insisted.

"I want too." Lisa saidm smiling as she leaned forward.

"A man spoke frantically into the phone '_My wife is pregnant and her contractions are only two minutes apart_!' '_is this her first child?_' The doctor asked. '_No!_' The man shouted, '_This is her husband_'…get it?" Abel asked, smiling at the groans emitting from the others- except Lisa who merely played with her hair and laughed merrily for his sake.

...

Despite the fact that this was no where near Paige's first time attending, 'Destroy the hero' she still always had a bad case of nerves as she neared the gym for her PE class, trying to get past the mobs of students going past her.

"This should be fun huh?" A girl who bypassed Paige asked with a smile, before entering the gym.

"Real fun." Paige mumbled, as she entered the gym-immediately bombarded with the thoughts of others. Paige cringed as she quickly made her way up the bleachers to hide out behind the biggest guy she could find; this was a trick she had learned a while back when she didn't want to participate in certain activities.

In no time the gym started to fill up with students trying to shove into the bleachers, which was a much longer process than one would think, due to the fact that where each student sat was very symbolic to their character and ego as an up-coming Villain. It was an unspoken law that whoever sat towards the top of the bleachers was admitting lacking the necessary strength for the PE games and worst yet, was admitting fear. Those who sat more towards the middle of the bleachers usually were either trying to protect their reputation but did not want to get chosen - or as was the case sometimes, they might just not care either way. The students that sat at the very bottom and closest to the ring, with the shield all around its sides, were those that were very enthusiastic about the sports and most likely had large ego's regarding their strength; they were always the first to offer their participation.

"Hey," A young thirteen year old, thin blonde girl greeted Paige, as she sat down beside her. Paige looked over at her and offered up a smiled.

"Hey, just the girl I was hoping to see." Paige teased, the girl - whose name was Candy - rolled her eyes with a smile.

"Oh, I wonder why.." She teased back. "Naw, the truth of the matter is that I was looking for you." Candy admitted, poking Paige in the arm playfully.

"Oh?" Paige asked distractedly, looking back towards the ring to keep a look out for Mr. Galindo, her Powers Education (PE) teacher. This class always had her very edgy.

"Yeah. Ricky's over there." Candy hinted, nodding her head towards the left in an attempt to be subtle, Paige glanced over.

"You want me to sort out his voice from all the other ones in my head..?" Paige asked incredulously.

"Well...it's a good thing Paige, really, come-on try it, you have to train anyway right?" Candy asked eagerly. "Just try it" Paige glared at her.

"I better be getting A LOT of cotton candy for this.." She warned jokingly.

"_Dahn rahn._" Candy assured with a grinning, rubbing her hands together-fluffs of pink starting to appear to give Paige a preview. Paige nodded, exhaling as she tried to focus on the boy a couple of people down their row, for a few seconds before her eyes started narrowing on his voice.

_Lao tyen yeh...I wonder who they're going to use.._

Paige faintly brought her hand to her forehead with a frown, looking back up at Candy.

"What?" Candy asked. "Is he thinking of me?" She asked hopeful, her smile beginning to fade to confusion when she saw how grim Paige looked.

"...Somebody told him that they're using a real human today." Paige said quietly. Candy's eyes widened, looking over at her long time crush in surprise.

"Huh.." Candy mumbled with an exhale, astounded. A loud whistle was heard and their attention was immediately brought to the front of the ring where Mr. Galindo stood in a high platform in front of a chair, holding a clipboard, and dressed in his usual black sweats and black school jacket with red lettering.

"Listen up everybody" He called loudly. "Today, as most of you probably know, we will be doing Destroy the Hero, and in an unusual treat," Mr. Galindo started as a hatch door opens from the center of the ceiling. "We have a hero for the game." The Gym went into a booing frenzy when the colorfully dressed hero was lowered down to dangle high above the ground. Loud, excited murmurs filled the gym as the booing began to die down. "Until someone puts them in the tank that is," Mr. Galindo riled up, grinning as the a hatch at the center floor of the ring opened up and a tank rose up, eagerly approved by the loudly cheering students. "Alright, settle down." Mr. Galindo commanded, amused. "As usual, there will be two teams of two. Get down here if I call you and gear up," He instructed, looking through the sets of bleachers - feeling particularly cruel this day - as he picked the first group from two students on the higher sets of bleachers [Group 1] and the other two from the first row at the bottom [Group 2]. Once the two teams geared up they met in the ring and looked up towards Mr. Galindo, who now addressed them.

"Most of you understand the game but for those that don't, this is Destroy the Hero, you have three minutes to immobilize your opposing Villains and get to that button up there." He said pointing upwards near the Hero. "When that button is pressed the Hero's chain unlocks and the hero falls into the Tank; the team that presses that button first wins, if neither team gets to the button in the three minutes alloted then the chain that's holding up the hero whisks him back up and away from danger and both teams loose. Any questions?" Receiving none, he nodded in satisfaction. "I don't have to remind you all what an honor it is to have your first Hero kill be in our majestic institution, make UVA proud." He urged. Feeling the atmosphere was riled up and ready for the action, Mr. Galindo loudly began to shout, "3, 2, 1, BATTLE!" Immediately the two teams went into action at each other for a few intense minutes, Group 2, from the bottom bleachers easily pummeling the opposing team.

From the side of the gym, right outside the tot classroom stood an immobilized Hank, who watched the match with complete horror; his eyes pin pointed on the bruised, and accidentally exposed, UVA symbol on the inside of the wrist of the "hero" dangling from the chains. He knew the moment the hatch was opened that it would be AJ that would come down, and as sure as the evil that consumed the souls of everyone in this place, it was him.

"Thirty seconds left!" Mr. Galindo shouted. Hank looked over at Galindo before allowing his eyes to go back to his unmoving best friend; they had really done it, they'd killed him because of a pill. They were unbelievable. Group 1; the weaker of the two teams managed to knock one of the opposing team members out by slamming them against the tank and went back to the fray, struggling to overcome the remaining member. "Twenty seconds!" Mr. Galindo shouted. Hank immediately looked up towards AJ again - his heart starting to speed up with hope - they weren't going to make it, they only had twenty seconds left; maybe by the time they got the next match started he could find a way to get AJ out of there. He looked up at the opening where AJ had been lowered down from, trying to figure out where that was, ignoring the louder cheering from the crowd of students, Hank quickly made his way out of the gymnasium.

".._Lao tyen yeh_" Paige groaned, burying her face in her hands and dropping her head down onto her knees. Candy put a comforting hand on her back, concerned, as she rubbed up and down.

"Paige..?"

"He's awake - he's awake, he's freaken awake, Candy." Paige head came up, eyes panicked, as both girls looked up at the limp person who hung horizontally in the air.

"10! 9-" Mr. Galindo began the count-down. They all stared as a member from Group 1, the weaker team was thrown off to the side, the only remaining two opponents fighting it out still. The only standing fighter from Group 1 was slammed clear across the room and the remaining team member from Group 2 used the opportunity to fly up towards the button. Driven by adrenaline, the male from Group 1 who'd just been thrown down, sprang back to his feet with his hands and sprinted towards the Tank; using his momentum to propel himself up off the tank and jumped off his opponent before slamming his open palm on the button just as Mr. Galindo shouted, "1!" and the buzzard simultaneously went off. The loudest roar of approval swept over the Gymnasium as students shouted, whooped, and rapidly stomped on the ground in excitement as Group 1 was declared victorious.

Mr. Galindo was just lowering back down the arms of the victors as they heard the first of the chains snap off loudly. The crowd quieted down, eyes glued to the Hero, as another of the chains snapped loose.

"..No, no.." Paige muttered frantically. "I can't-"

"Paige, please!" Candy pleaded, holding onto the shaking girl. "You have to calm-"

"He's too loud-I cant," Another chain snapped off and Paige nearly felt her eyes cross in pain as she folded over, grabbing her head as she screamed - the howl of agony, of fear, and of sorrow - that the man about to fall to his death could not vocalize. Many of the students began to turn to look at Paige but the whole room fell into dead silence as the unmistakable last of the four chains holding AJ up, snapped off.

Hank nearly fell from the ceiling hatch as he threw his entire body towards the chain, having tried to catch it before it snapped off, but his hands having closed on nothing but air. With his hands holding the edges of the hatch opening, Hank looked down inside the tank beneath him without so much as a blink; the only noise registering in his mind was the sounds of ripping flesh coming from the tank, from his best friend.

His fists clenched the edges tightly, failing to notice that he was drawing blood from his palms. He blinked as the hatch he was looking through began to close. Hank sat up - his knees still on the ground - watching the hatch close painfully slowly, almost mockingly slow, as it revealed the school logo on. His eyes narrowed on that logo, reading that one word that embodied evil completely; UVA. He shakily began to pick himself up, distractedly wiping the blood off his hands on his shirt, as he exited the room and walked through the school halls, seeing everything with new eyes; three words pounding in his head like a unbudging mantra.

_UVA will pay…_

* * *

_**Translations:**_

Gomen (Japanese) Sorry.

Konichiwa (Japanese) hello.

seichō arigatōgozaimashita (Japanese) Thank you for listening.

Wo qui qui nile (Chinese) I beg you.

Ta ma de hundan (Japanese) F-ing bastards.

Iie (Japanese) No.

Gorram (Chinese) F- word.

Wei (Chinese) Hey/Hello.

Dahn rahn (Chinese) Of course.

Lao tyen yeh (Chinese)

* * *

_**Next Chapter: **"Go ahead" Ruby said shyly. "But you probably shouldn't eat it"_

_"And why the gui not?" Jordan asked stopping his hand over the peach cobbler. _

_"Your allergic to peaches" Ruby reminded._

* * *

_**Note:** _Thanks for the patience and reviews! Keep reviewing! More interesting things should start happening now, please stay tuned!

**:) Thank you! Arigatou! Shukran! Merci! Gracias! Grazzi! Danke Schon! Diolch:)**


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